The news hit like a bombshell: LG, one of the most well-known and innovative smartphone manufacturers, is leaving the mobile market and will no longer manufacture smartphones in the future. This was preceded by quarters of declines in sales. The situation is similar at Sony, as a look at the group’s current business figures shows.
Sony sells fewer smartphones but earns more
Between April 2020 and March 2021, the Japanese were able to sell only 2.9 million smartphones. In 2019, Sony managed to bring 3.2 million smartphones to the public, up from 6.5 million a year earlier. In particular, the crash between 2018 and 2019 is dramatic. In 12 months, sales of Sony’s smartphone division have more than halved. Read Also: Sony Is Working On A New Way To Provide Access To PS Games On Phones A consolation for Sony: There is growth in sales. The traditional group has thus generated more sales with fewer smartphones sold. This seems to be the high-price strategy that Sony has been pursuing for some time. Compared to Samsung or Xiaomi, the company sells fewer smartphones, but the discontinued devices are on average more expensive. For the recently unveiled Xperia 1 III, Sony is charging US-Dollar 1,200 in the US if it is scheduled to go on sale in early summer. European prices have not yet been communicated, but are likely to be in similar spheres.
Sony celebrates success with PlayStation 5 and PS Plus
For Sony, however, things are much better on the PlayStation 5. The Group was able to sell 7.8 million units from the gaming console by the end of the first quarter of 2021 – despite ongoing delivery difficulties. And the subscription service PS Plus is also very popular and now has around 47 million subscribers. With this success at the back, Sony can certainly cope with one or the other unsold Xperia phone.
