By Sneha Shankar - Sony Corp (TOKYO:6758) expects a consolidated loss of about 50 billion yen ($489 million) in the fiscal year ending March 31, 2015 as it works toward steering its troubled consumer electronics business toward profitability, the company said Wednesday when it released quarterly results.
The Japanese company, which is also present in other segments such as mobile phones, games, financial services, movies and music and has struggled to keep up with relatively recent entrants such as Samsung and LG, began a restructuring in April and posted a consolidated loss of 128 billion yen ($1.25 billion) for the fiscal ending March 2014, despite analysts’ projections that the company would return bonuses, dragging it to a sixth net loss in seven years.
“Consolidated sales for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2015 are expected to be essentially flat due to an increase in sales in the electronics businesses being offset by an expected decrease in PC sales included in All Other related to Sony’s withdrawal from the PC business,” the company said in the earnings release Wednesday.
In February, Sony had announced that it would cut nearly 5,000 jobs, sold its personal computer, or PC, business and decided to separate its television business into a standalone, yet wholly-owned unit. The company said in the release that it expects to narrow its loss from PC sales to 80 billion yen ($780 million) in the 2015 fiscal from 91.7 billion yen ($900 million) last fiscal. On May 1, Sony had revised up its loss forecast for the 2014 fiscal year to 130 billion yen ($1.27 billion) from 110 billion yen ($1.08 billion) it had estimated in February.
“Although Sony is reducing the scale of its sales companies in response to the decrease in PC sales, with the goal of achieving this reduction by the end of the fiscal year ending March 31, 2015, sales company fixed costs are expected to be charged in the PC business in the fiscal year ending March 31, 2015,” the company said, in the release.
The company posted a 14.3 percent increase in sales for the 2014 fiscal, and attributed it to “the favorable impact of foreign exchange rates, the launch of the PlayStation4 (PS4), as well as a significant increase in sales of smartphones.”