Sony has not integrated previous Sony Ericsson into the whole company. Its just changed the name from Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications AB to Sony Mobile Communications AB with the same headquarters in London and even the same CEO and president, Bert Nordberg, who was he host of the press conference tonight. So this shows the minimum change within the company.Also it seems there is no change in the company'd strategy. Sony is using the same way that previously experienced and failed in Sony Ericsson, producing the same looking phones with different specifications and sizes! Xperia P and Xperia U are completely similar to Xperia S in design but they have different specifications. But how come? It is obvious that Sony Ericsson has not been successful especially in recent years. The company has lost its market share dramatically behind its competitors from market leaders such as Nokia, Samsung and Apple to the newcomers such as ZTE. Does the company think that they do not to have to change anything and can go straight forward to the success without any change? I don't think so!
Sony is one of the most innovative companies in the world but its strong weakness is the company's structure and internal communications and collaborations between departments.
Lets have a look at the company's different islands at the MWC 2012, As it mentioned Sony Mobile Communications is one of the biggest exhibitors at the congress but what about other small islands. For instance FeliCa Networks, Inc, which is another wholly-owned subsidiary of Sony and is providing contactless IC card technology is at the congress as well. They also had an announcement regarding the partnership with NXP " to Create a Unique NFC Radio Controller Interoperable with Global Infrastructure" But why Sony did not mentioned anything about FeliCa in its press conference? Why they did not share their stands together instead of act as different and independent entities? I bet many of audiences even do not know that is any relation between Sony and FeliCa! But Why?
That's the old bad habit of Sony to make independent companies which do not collaborate with each other effectively. That is why Sony with the valuable archive of Music from Sony Music company and being the pioneer of portable music player lost its position to Apple iPod.
If Hirai which is going to be the new CEO from April wants bigger portion of market share and also mind share pie, he should integrate mobile business into the whole company and try to DELIVER the integrated user experience within all devices (smartphones, tablets, TVs and even music player, camcorders and cameras) not only talking about that.
Finally, delivering integrated user experience without having applications in the portfolio is kind of useless. Sony has managed to put together music, video and game in its Sony Entertainment Network (SEN) but there is still a big dark hole in its portfolio, applications. Previously Sony Ericsson tried to provide applications and mobile contents through its Playnow service and also its dedicated channel in Android Market. As Android now is the main platform for Sony which is using in its smartphones, tablets and even TVs (equipped with the Google TV), applications and contents can be provided through a unique channel and it seems SEN is the best place to provide them to consumers along with music, video and games.
So this is the only way for Sony to use its core competences against competitors, otherwise the company will be transformed to something like Panasonic today:
Huge but unprofitable!
No comments:
Post a Comment