Thursday, February 28, 9:39 AM
Sony (SNE +0.8%) will bring in $445M during the current financial quarter for the sale of its Sony City Osaki office building in Tokyo. The plan to put the building on the market was announced last month.
1 Comment[Consumer, Global & FX]
Tuesday, February 26, 10:20 AM
Sony (SNE +1.2%) will pay InterDigital (IDCC +1.3%) $125M in cash over 3 years under the terms of their recent 3G/4G patent licensing deal, InterDigital discloses in its 2012 10-K. $22.3 of that total was recognized in Q4, fueling a big earnings beat. InterDigital, which recently formed an R&D JV with Sony in tandem with its licensing deal, has also acquired patents from the electronics giant it estimates are worth $28.9M.
Comment![Tech]
Monday, February 25, 7:52 PM
Japanese stocks stumble out of the gate, falling sharply in early trading as a powerful rally in the yen and a sell-off in U.S. stocks overnight dampens sentiment. The Nikkei Average falls 2.1% to 11,420, with shares hit hard across the board: Sony (SNE -2.8%), Nikon (NINOY.PK -3.4%), Advantest (ATE -3.1%), and Honda (HMC -2.7%).
Comment![Global & FX]
Monday, February 25, 5:40 PM
Desperate to become less dependent on Google/Apple, over a dozen carriers are now backing Mozilla's Firefox OS - the list includes Sprint (S), Telefonica (TEF), T-Mobile (DTEGY.PK), and America Movil (AMX). Sony (SNE), Huawei, ZTE, LG, and Alcatel (ALU) plan to make hardware for the platform, but Samsung, which is committed to Tizen as an Android alternative, isn't interested. An AMX exec promises $100 Firefox phones will arrive; Android phones are already in that price range in emerging markets. (previous)
3 Comments[Tech]
Thursday, February 21, 12:02 PM
Sony (SNE -2.6%) continues to slump following its PlayStation 4 event. The company's failure to reveal pricing info or actual hardware has drawn criticism, and some aren't impressed with the graphics improvements relative to the PS3. AMD (AMD -4.1%), later confirmed as the PS4's CPU/GPU supplier, is also lower, and so is GameStop (GME -1.7%) - though Sony promised not to block used games, the PS4's support for on-demand purchases via Gaikai might be weighing on shares. Activision (ATVI +0.4%) is outperforming a bit after announcing Diablo IIIwill be released for the PS4. (previous)
Comment![Tech, On the Move]
Wednesday, February 20, 7:49 PM
Sony Corp. (SNE) bucks a weak local tape to trade up 0.7% in the Japanese market after unveiling the PlayStation 4 at a New York event. The company also said earlier that it will book a $1.2B one-time gain from the sale of an online medical-service stake. Rival Nintendo (NTDOY.PK +1.4%) also rallies on the news.
Comment![Tech, Global & FX, On the Move]
Wednesday, February 20, 6:49 PM
More on the PlayStation 4: Gaikai will allow users to test and stream PS4 titles. PS3 titles aren't natively supported on the PS4, but Sony is exploring the use of "advanced technologies" to enable PS3 gameplay (previous). A feature called Remote Play allows PS4 games to be played on the Vita. Smartphones/tablets will support companion apps, but not gameplay. A partnership with Ustream enables the broadcasting of PS4 activity. (live blog)
Comment![Tech]
Wednesday, February 20, 6:36 PM
Sony (SNE) unveils the PlayStation 4. As was rumored, the console will use an x86 CPU and an enhanced PC GPU (most likely from AMD), and rely on controllers sporting touchpads. There's plenty of social networking/online video integration, and games can be downloaded in the background. Cloud gaming platform Gaikai is supported. No details yet on pricing. SNE +2.1% AH. (live blog) (previous) Update:AnandTech confirms AMD is the CPU and GPU supplier. Both processors will be integrated on the same chip.
2 Comments[Tech]
Wednesday, February 20, 11:28 AM
Cutting-edge Oscilloscope says it will be the first film distribution company to release a feature movie through mobile service Vine in a process which will chop its release up into a series of short looping videos. Though certainly not yet a medium which threatens the Hollywood studio model (TWX, DIS, LGF, VIAB, CMCSA, SNE), the development brings up some interesting revenue and promotional opportunities if the big players can harness the Internet interaction of their movies outside of the obligatory YouTube channel.
Comment![Consumer]
Wednesday, February 20, 5:07 AM
Sony (SNE) plans to sell 6% of shares in its M3 marketing subsidiary as part of a rebalancing of its business assets. As a result of the divestment, Sony expects to post an operating profit of ¥115B ($1.23B) in the fiscal year through March.
1 Comment[Tech, Consumer, Earnings]
Monday, February 18, 3:35 PM
Ahead of a Wednesday PS4 event that some expect will include news of a PS3 cut, Sony (SNE) is slashing the Japanese MSRP for the PlayStation Vita by 20% to ¥19,980 ($215). Vita sales have slumped in the face of tough competition from Nintendo's (NTDOY.PK) 3DS and smartphone/tablet alternatives - Japanese iPhone sales have taken off over the last year. Separately, the WSJ reports Sony plans to emphasize the PS4's social networking and multiplayer gaming capabilities, with the latter possibly encompassing mobile devices.
1 Comment[Tech]
Monday, February 18, 5:24 AM
A long-running SEC investigation into possible corruption by U.S. movie studios in China is casting a shadow over Hollywood's dealings in the country, especially as there hasn't been too much information on the inquiry's progress. At the same time, Chinese consumers have started to prefer home-grown blockbusters over Hollywood fare. Still, the show goes on, with "Kung Fu Panda 3" and "Iron Man 3" among the projects that use China for filming.
4 Comments[Consumer]
Wednesday, February 13, 8:29 PM
Japanese stocks move higher in early trading, as investors shrug off weak GDP data and focus their attention on a central bank decision due out later in the day. The Nikkei Average rose 0.4% to 11,291, with the blue chips most active: Sony (SNE +1.3%), Fujitsu (FJTSY.PK +0.7%), Olympus (OCPNY.PK +1.2%), Hitachi (HTHIY.PK -1%) and Nissan (NSANY.PK -0.8).
3 Comments[Global & FX]
Wednesday, February 13, 5:03 AM
More on mobile phone sales: Q4 smartphone market share by OS: Android 69.7% vs 51.3% in 2011, iOS 20.9% vs 23.6%, BlackBerry 3.5% vs 8.8%, Microsoft 3% vs 1.8%. "With Samsung commanding over 42.5% of the Android market globally, and the next vendor at just 6% share, the Android brand is being overshadowed by Samsung's brand with the Galaxy name nearly a synonym for Android phones in consumers' mind share," says Gartner. (PR)
23 Comments[Tech, Consumer, Top Stories]
Wednesday, February 13, 5:00 AM
More on mobile phone sales: Samsung's total 2012 sales 384.6M units, giving it 22% market share vs 17.7% in 2011. Nokia 333.9M and 19.1% vs 23.8%. Apple 130.1M and 7.5% vs 5%. Samsung is also the leading vendor of smartphones, while in Q4, Huawei takes number three spot with sales of 27.2M. (PR)
4 Comments[Tech, Consumer, Top Stories]
Ghosts of Kariela: Think Mario, Zelda, Super smash bros, Halo so on. Nintendo's consoles may be subpar at times, but the game quailty makes up for it,
Feb 10, 10:08 PM
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Ghosts of Kariela: Sony has metal gear, god of war and killzone though. Metal Gear is their strongest one though, not as strong as Nintendo brands tho
Feb 10, 10:12 PM
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jimmy4winners I wont sell SONY $SNE at 20 the Ads/music business is big,finance is the #1 sector ,sony has hands in Finance and insurance
Feb 8, 2:05 PM
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jimmy4winners $SNE SONY investment will come through ,the ban on Sony and msft products be profitable in China sales" china allows both to sell products"