Sony sees solid growth on TV, cameras sales
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Sony Corp. (6758.T)  said on  Wednesday it sees its electronics sales growth outpacing the  industry in the current fiscal year, fueled by demand for big  televisions and digital cameras, while a decline in component  pricing could benefit profits.
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Swedish-Japanese mobile phone maker Sony Ericsson reported higher fourth-quarter sales and average selling prices than expected on Tuesday, saying its 3G handsets and camera phones were driving the growth.
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Sony Corp., the world leader in video  equipment, finds itself in the unusual position of playing  catch-up in the next battleground for technology used in  cameras, video recorders and phones.
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Sony Corp  said it would launch a  new digital single lens reflex camera for advanced users in  November, broadening its product lineup in a move to take on  industry leaders Canon Inc  and Nikon Corp .
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Sony Corp. (6758.T: Quote, Profile, Research) on Wednesday said it had no plans to abandon the market for plasma-screen television sets in the United States in the near term, though
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(InfoWorld) - Sony's core electronics business more than doubled profits in the last quarter of 2006, but failed to offset price cuts to itsÂ PlayStation 3 game console, leading to an overall profit decline of just over 5 percent, the company said Tuesday. The company said sales and operating revenue increased 9.8 percent to Â¥2.6 trillion ($21.4 billion) while net profit fell 5.3 percent to Â¥159.9 billion. Sony Computer Entertainment, the division responsible for its PlayStation gaming consoles, was the only one of Sony's main business units that registered a loss in the quarter. It lost Â¥54.2 billion primarily due to the retail price of the more expensive of the two consoles being reduced from a planned Â¥62,790 to Â¥49,980 in Japan. The cut was made, Sony said, due to negative feedback from consumers. Sony's electronics business saw profits more than double to Â¥177.4 billion on 16.9 percent higher sales of Â¥1.9 trillion, the company said. The unit had a generally positive quarter with sales of Bravia LCD (liquid crystal display) televisions and Cybershot digital still cameras increasing. Europe saw the biggest percentage sales jump, up 21 percent, thanks to better LCD TV and Vaio PC sales, while tough competition in the U.S. TV market meant sales there increased by just 3 percent. Sony Pictures returned to profitability as sales there jumped 47 percent, but sales in the financial services division fell 9 percent. Underlining the generally positive results, Sony revised its full-year profit forecast upward for the year to the end of March. It now expects to record a net profit of Â¥110 billion for the year, up from its previous forecast of Â¥80 billion, although still lower than the Â¥124 billion it reported last year. The sales forecast was left unchanged. Sony's mid-term business plan has targeted a profit margin of 5 percent for the coming fiscal year. Sony's electronics business is already meeting its part of the target and will continue to do so next year however the games unit needs to improve, Sony's chief financial officer Nobuyuki Oneda said at a Tokyo news conference on Tuesday. He expects to bring the company's games unit closer to break-even in the second half, he said. Sony will target cost savings in the PlayStation 3 by introducing more advanced chips and consolidating components to reduce the overall number of parts, he said. The company is already on the way to the first of these targets, with the recent start of production of a new version of the Cell processor built with a 65-nanometer production process. The chip in current consoles is built using a 90-nanometer process and the upcoming switch will mean a chip that is 40 percent smaller. Costs will fall in line with the size reduction, Sony said. It did not say when the new chip will appear in consoles. Sony wouldn't provide anyÂ PlayStation 3 shipment estimatesÂ for the coming financial year but said it remains confident it will ship 6 million consoles up to March. It also revised upwards its PlayStation 2 shipment forecast from 11 million units to 13 million units. Sony counts shipments as finished consoles leaving its factory for Sony warehouses and distributors. Oneda ruled out the possibility of further price cuts in the near future, but hinted that this could happen in two or three years' time. Â
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TOKYO -- A recovery in electronics sales offset losses in video games and helped boost Sony's profit for the July-to-September quarter more than 40-fold over the same period a year ago.
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Eastman Kodak Co., in the midst of its strengthening its position in digital imaging, said Wednesday it expects sales of digital products and services to increase by about 36 per cent between 2003 and 2007.
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Sony Corp. said Monday that 1.2 million PlayStation 3 game consoles sold in North America during the key holiday season, boosting the strength of the electronics giant's Blu-ray next-generation video format.
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Sony Corp  swung to a quarterly operating profit as it booked strong sales of personal computers and digital cameras and benefited from a weaker yen, and it raised its full-year forecast by 2 percent.
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Sony Corp.  and Canon Inc.  are expected to deliver strong results as Japanese electronics makers gear up for quarterly earnings this week, driven by robust digital camera sales and a softer yen.
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TOKYO - Sony Corp is attempting to claw back market share of the domestic flat-panel TV market with the launch of eight new televisions.
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The photography industry expects U.S. digital camera sales growth to slow to about 13 percent this year, as the market matures after growing at a breakneck pace for almost a decade, according to a report released on Thursday.
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Sony Corp. (6758.T) on Wednesday said it had no plans to abandon the market for plasma-screen television sets in the United States in the near term, though it did not say specifically what its intentions were internationally.
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Sony is focusing its TV business strategy on liquid-crystal displays and rear-projection television sets, but will continue to assemble and sell plasma display sets for now, the company said Monday.
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The Consumer Electronics Association predicts solid growth in gadget sales this year.
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Plus: Camera sales boost Matsushita profits...Verizon sales rise, led by wireless growth...Motorola shares rise after profit beats estimates...Electronics sales push Sony to profit.