Report: Sony Shrinks Games Losses, To Miss Goals

As translated by Reuters, The Nikkei Business Daily has reported that Sony’s video game division saw its operating loss shrink by about ¥100 billion ($956 million) in the previous fiscal year. Previously, the game unit had posted a ¥232 billion ($2.24 billion) operating loss in the year ended March 2007, primarily due to start-up costs for the PlayStation 3. Sony’s PlayStation division recorded a profit for the first time since the PlayStation 3’s launch in the company’s third financial quarter ending December 31st, 2007. The game unit posted an operating income up from a loss of ¥54.2 billion ($524 million) the previous year to a positive figure of ¥12.9 billion ($125 million) attributing the increase to reduced PlayStation 3 hardware costs. The Nikkei Business Daily also expects that the company will report a fivefold operating profit jump to ¥380 billion ($3.6 billion) on the strength of digital camera sales in its full-year earnings report on May 14. Despite the rise, the company will likely miss its forecast by ¥30 billion ($290 million). Sony spokeswoman Mami Imada stated that the The Nikkei Business Daily report was based on the paper’s speculation and declined to provide any further comment.