Sony Corp Announces FY05 Results News
Chris Leyton
27/04/2006
Six million Playstation3 units shipped worldwide before March 31st 2007...
Sony Corporation today posted strong consolidated results for the 2005 fiscal year, as a result of increased demand for its LCD TV products and its financial services based upon a favourable Japanese stock market, but predicted a sharp fall in profits for the current year ending March 31st 2007. In the period between April 1st 2005 - March 31st 2006, Sony saw a 67.9% increase in operating income from 113.9 billion yen (£558.5 million) in FY04 to 191.3 billion yen (£937.8 million) in FY05, though net income dropped by 24.5% to 123.6 billion yen (£605.2 million).
Looking ahead Sony expects operating income to take a sharp dive in FY06, from the 191.3 billion yen (£937.8 million) recorded in FY05 to 100 billion yen (£489.7 million). Despite this Sony predicts a slight 5% increase in net income, from 123.6 billion yen (£605.2 million) to 130 billion yen (£636.4 million), as a result of continued restructuring plans.
Despite recording an increase of 31.4% in sales from the Games division, operating income suffered a dramatic fall compared to the last fiscal year, dropping 79.7% from 43.2 billion yen (£211.6 million) to 8.7 billion yen (£42.6 million) as a result of year-end expenses. During FY05 Sony recorded 16.22 million shipments of the Playstation2 compared to 16.17 million units in FY04, during the same periods the PSP saw shipments increase by 373% from 2.97 million units to 14.06 million. Sales of PS2 software took a drop of 12% between FY04 and FY05, from 252 million to 223 million, however this was offset somewhat by a 630% increase in PSP sales, from 5.70 million to 41.60 million units.
Sony predicts a significant loss in the current year as a result of the preparation towards the Playstation3 launch, whilst further predictions in terms of shipments throughout FY06 (ending March 31st 2007) reveals Sony's intentions to ship 6 million Playstation3 units, although both the PSP and Playstation2 will see slight drops to 12 million and 10 million units respectively.