So far we have heard about
the new strategy outline from the new CEO of Sony, Kaz Hirai. Among the
announced strategies on March 2012, Sony made it clear it that one of the most
important areas for further growth of the company will be medical equipment
business. Prior to the announcement Sony acquired Micronics, a us based medical
company which is involved in the research and development of near patient Point
of Care devices for disease diagnosis, treatment monitoring and blood testing,
and also provides comprehensive product development for third-party clients.
Also, the medical foot prints can be recognised in their recent acquisition of
So-Net as the wholly owned subsidiary of the company.
Although we have not heard
much about the details of the medical strategy from Sony, but those
acquisitions can give us an outline from the strategy of the company which can
be summarised as a B2B business including developing a new range of high-tech
medical devices for doctors, physicians and hospitals with ability to connect
to each other thanks to the solutions that previously developed and implemented
by So-Net.
Why Sony is
WRONG while Apple is right?
A quick SWOT analysis on
Sony can reveal that the company has been successful in design and development
of the high end consumer electronics while business segment of the company has
not been so successful so far. So the question is why Sony has not focused on
medical consumer electronic devices such as hearing aids instead of B2B devices?
Now a day hearing aids are
among the most sophisticated consumer medical devices which need a revolution
in the connected and everything smart era. Today hearing aids can connect to
the smartphones or TVs but indirectly. The revolution in smartphones provides a
variety of ways to improve the hearing aids connectivity with different devices
such as smartphones and tablets for example using the smartphone as a remote control for hearing aids or using the hearing aids as the headsets or many other applications and usages.
Again Apple found it first! Not surprisingly Made-For-iPhone hearing
aids features were among the new features on iOS 6 by Apple.
10% of Americans are hearing
impaired and the hearing impairment rates around the world are almost the same.
So it seems Apple again got it right and tried to enter to a new and untapped
market with a strong support from its hardware and software background.
Sony and its
Android ambitions
Sony officials have made it
clear that they want to be the first Android device maker in the world. The
acquisition of Sony Ericsson was in aligning with this ambition and they wanted
to make an integrated platform based on Android to make synergy between their
devices.
While Apple is working with
hearing aids maker to add hearing aids in its ecosystem, Sony can produce its
own hardware and add it to its newly created platform based on Android.
Sony has everything to
produce a range of sophisticated hearing aids that can make seamless and wireless
connection to every electronic devices.
Sony is the only
one which can overcome the visibility barrier
The last reason that can
support entering to hearing aids business which is the most important in my view
is the most important barrier of wearing hearing aids, their visibilities!
Yes the visibility of
hearing aids is the most important reason that people do not wear hearing aids
but what do you think about Sony branded hearing aids that look like headphones
or headsets?
I think many hearing
impaired would wear them because no one thinks that they are hearing aids!
Also Sony has a strong
footprint on miniaturize electronic devices and may change the whole industry dramatically
by making barely visible, good looking and wireless hearing aids.
Sony's Japanese rival Panasonic started to make hearing aids last year. However, Sony'd strong potential in making high-end portable devices and also stronger platform based on Android can make differentiation from Panasonic.
So if Sony wants to change
only one thing in the world it can do it now or never!
