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Business News Labels & Publishers
Sony Corp goes back into profit
By Chris Cooke | Published on Friday 10 May 2013
Sony Corp has moved back into profit after a number of years of loss-making madness, thanks in part to a weakening of the yen – the strength of the Japanese currency in recent years having hindered the value of the firm’s non-domestic profits.
In it’s latest earnings report, Sony reported a 93.9 billion yen ($948 million) profit for the final quarter of its last financial year, and a year-end profit of 43 billion yen ($434 million), compared to the 457 billion yen ($5.7 billion) loss it made in the previous year. Sony bosses said that they now expected the company’s recovery to continue, predicting a profit of 50 billion yen for the current financial year.
The Sony Music business, which includes Sony Corp’s three music companies (the worldwide record company, the Japanese record company and its half of the Sony/ATV publishing group), netted profits of $396 million on sales that were every so slightly down on the previous year, partly due the ongoing shift from physical to digital, and partly because of a less strong release schedule in Japan.
In related news, Sony Music has also confirmed that it’s purchase of half of the Now! That’s What I Call Music! franchise has been approved by European regulators. As previously reported, Universal was forced by competition regulators to sell what had been EMI’s half of the brand after it acquired the EMI record company. Sony was confirmed as the buyer in February.
