Sony Profits Down, PSP Sales Up

Kris Erickson • Oct 24, 2008 • Comments (0)

Sony may have experienced weaker earnings this year overall, but at least the PSP division is exceeding company expectations. Yesterday the company revised its annual earnings forecast down sharply from earlier estimates. Sony said it now expected net profit for this year to be ¥150 billion, a 59 percent drop from a year earlier, and 38 percent below the forecast it made in July. The company cited a strong Yen and global economic recession as two of the major reasons for this profit shortfall.

On the other hand, not all financial news was negative for Sony. The Playstation Portable has been one of the strongest selling gaming devices in Japan this year, and the company expects to exceed sales forecasts on the device. Sony previously stated that it expected to sell 15 million units of the device worldwide in 2008. It is now set to exceed that estimate by more than 1 million units. Redesigned hardware has helped boost sales of the PSP worldwide. Last week in Japan, the release of the new PSP 3000 prompted sales of approximately 150,000 units over a 4-day period.