US billionaire Daniel Loeb, who last year failed in an attempt to spin off a key part of Sony Corp, has sold his shares in the struggling firm, saying “more urgency will be necessary” to get it back on track.
Loeb’s Third Point LLC hedge fund last year pushed for Sony to hive off up to 20 percent of its successful US-based entertainment division, which includes a Hollywood studio and music label, to make it more profitable.
Sony rejected the proposal, which had grabbed international headlines and was widely portrayed as a clash of corporate cultures, pitting a hard-charging foreign billionaire against one of the bedrocks of Japan’s staid corporate sector.
Third Point said in a statement on Tuesday that despite profit warnings, a worse-than-expected electronics environment and slow macroeconomic reforms in Japan, it still generated nearly a 20 percent return on its investment.
However, it said Sony still has “a long way to go and we continue to believe that more urgency will be necessary to definitively turn around the company’s fortunes.”
Sony shares slipped 0.39 percent to ¥1,901.5 in Tokyo trading yesterday.
The once world-leading consumer electronics giant warned last month it would book a net loss of ¥230 billion (US$2.14 billion) in the fiscal year to March — more than four times its earlier forecast — blaming a downturn in its mobile phone business.
The company also said it would cut the smartphone unit’s global staff by 15 percent — about 1,000 jobs — and not pay dividends for the first time since its shares started trading in Tokyo in 1958.
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