Sony Corp, the world's second-largest maker of consumer electronics, is targeting corporate customers to increase Vaio notebook-computer sales and its share of the global PC market.
The company plans to raise sales to business users to 30 percent of total Vaio shipments by March 2010, from less than 10 percent now, Yoshihisa Ishida, head of Sony's Vaio business, said at a news conference in Tokyo yesterday. Sales of the Vaio, introduced in 1996, helped drive an 8.3 percent gain in Sony's fiscal second-quarter sales.
Ishida's remark came as the Tokyo-based company said it will sell its Vaio "type G" notebooks for about ?245,000 (US$2100) on Dec. 2. The laptop comes with a 12.1-inch LCD screen and a DVD recordable drive and weighs 898g, the lightest in the world, the company said.
PHOTO: AFP
Chief executive officer Howard Stringer said this week earnings at Sony's consumer electronics and movie divisions will help offset games losses. The company last month forecast its lowest annual profit in five years because of rising costs from its PlayStation business and a computer battery recall.
"Price competition in the computer industry is getting tough," said Koji Suzuki, a vice president of marketing at Sony. "We will try to halt further price declines by introducing computers for corporate users."
Shipments of notebook computers are expected to rise 26 percent this year, outpacing the 3.3 percent growth in desktop PCs, according to a September report from Gartner Inc. Laptop shipments will rise to 79.7 million units this year, the research firm said.
Sony forecasts a 14 percent increase to 4.2 million Vaio computer shipments worldwide this fiscal year ending March next year, including 1.1 million in Japan. The company shipped 3.7 million units last fiscal year, of which 3 million were notebooks and 700,000 were desktops. About 1 million of them were sold in Japan.
Toshiba Corp, the world's fifth-biggest PC maker, shipped 2.55 million computers worldwide in the third quarter, according to Gartner, with no figures given for Sony.
The Sony executives didn't comment on the battery recall. Sony last month said it will take a ?51.2 billion charge for the recall of 9.6 million batteries it made for PC makers including Dell Inc and Apple Computer Inc.
Net income for the year ending March 31 will probably drop 35 percent to ?80 billion, compared with an earlier estimate of ?130 billion, Sony said last month. Operating profit will decline 74 percent to ?50 billion, while the sales forecast was kept at ?8.23 trillion.
Beijing’s continued provocations in the Taiwan Strait reveal its intention to unilaterally change the “status quo” in the area, the US Department of State said on Saturday, calling for a peaceful resolution to cross-strait issues. The Coast Guard Administration (CGA) reported that four China Coast Guard patrol vessels entered restricted and prohibited waters near Kinmen County on Friday and again on Saturday. A State Department spokesperson said that Washington was aware of the incidents, and urged all parties to exercise restraint and refrain from unilaterally changing the “status quo.” “Maintaining peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait is in line with our [the
EXTENDED RANGE: Hsiung Sheng missiles, 100 of which might be deployed by the end of the year, could reach Chinese command posts and airport runways, a source said A NT$16.9 billion (US$534.93 million) project to upgrade the military’s missile defense systems would be completed this year, allowing the deployment of at least 100 long-range Hsiung Sheng missiles and providing more deterrence against China, military sources said on Saturday. Hsiung Sheng missiles are an extended-range version of the Hsiung Feng IIE (HF-2E) surface-to-surface cruise missile, and are believed to have a range of up to 1,200km, which would allow them to hit targets well inside China. They went into mass production in 2022, the sources said. The project is part of a special budget for the Ministry of National Defense aimed at
READY TO WORK: Taiwan is eager to cooperate and is hopeful that like-minded states will continue to advocate for its inclusion in regional organizations, Lai said Maintaining the “status quo” in the Taiwan Strait, and peace and stability in the Indo-Pacific region must be a top priority, president-elect William Lai (賴清德) said yesterday after meeting with a delegation of US academics. Leaders of the G7, US President Joe Biden and other international heads of state have voiced concerns about the situation in the Strait, as stability in the region is necessary for a safe, peaceful and prosperous world, Lai said. The vice president, who is to be inaugurated in May, welcomed the delegation and thanked them for their support for Taiwan and issues concerning the Strait. The international community
COOPERATION: Two crewmembers from a Chinese fishing boat that sank off Kinmen were rescued, two were found dead and another two were still missing at press time The Coast Guard Administration (CGA) was yesterday working with Chinese rescuers to find two missing crewmembers from a Chinese fishing boat that sank southwest of Kinmen County yesterday, killing two crew. The joint operation managed to rescue two of the boat’s six crewmembers, but two were already dead when they were pulled from the water, the agency said in a statement. Rescuers are still searching for two others from the Min Long Yu 61222, a boat registered in China’s Fujian Province that capsized and sank 1.03 nautical miles (1.9km) southwest of Dongding Island (東碇), it added. CGA Director-General Chou Mei-wu (周美伍) told a