Sony Group Corp has raised its operating income forecast by 6% to 1.04 trillion yen for the entire year. The company has reported results surpassing expectations for the quarter ending September 2021.
As per Bloomberg news, the Tokyo-based electronic company has reported an operating profit of 318. 5 billion yen for the said period. It surpassed the analysts’ estimates of 285.1 billion yen. Sony upgrading its outlook is attributed to its improved music, electronics, and movies business. This also includes the expectation of a net income of 730 billion yen.
Sony’s share surged by 4.7% in Tokyo on Friday after the results.
The fear of home entertainment fading owing to the pandemic did not prevent Sony from posting a strong Qtr. 2 results thanks to the improved product mix of Television, Digital cameras, Video, and audio products. CEO Kenichiro Yoshida said that Sony’s group structure is such that it maintains steady earnings irrespective of global conditions.
As per Sony, the tight supply position PlayStation 5 to continue till next year. The company sold 3.3 million consoles which have been limited ever since it was launched in November last year. The sales improved in the 1st Quarter of 2021, but revenue declined due to lower games purchase.
The monthly subscriber of PlayStation Network also declined for the third quarter in a row, with 104 million subscribers. PlayStation Plus has 47.2 million subscribers.
Due to chip shortages, PlayStation 5 is behind analysts’ expectations for this year, as per analyst Hideki Yasuda of Ace Research Institute. He said that despite strong demand for the PlayStation 5 console, Sony would not be able to achieve its target of 14.8 million sales for this financial year.
The more robust business units of the company were partly driven by an increase in the artists being played on Sony’s streaming services and robust mobile games revenue at home in Japan. With Universal Music Group acquiring K-pop boy band BTS may pose a challenge from now on.
