WIRE REPORTS

'Grace Card' to get national release -- Sony-owned companies buy Christian ... California Chronicle For an undisclosed sum, Provident Films and Affirm Films, two Sony Corp.-owned companies with a focus on the Christian market, have purchased release rights ... Take-Two Lifts Forecast as Game Maker's Profit Tops Estimates; Shares Jump Bloomberg s newly redesigned Xbox game console and lower prices for Sony Corp.'s PlayStation 3, said Mike Hickey an analyst for Janco Partners Inc. in Greenwood ... and more » Gran Turismo 5 PS3 Collector's SKU pre-order sales accelerate Punch Jump (blog) Advanced sales for Sony Corp.'s Gran Turismo 5 Collector's Edition for the Playstation 3 revved up this week at retailer Amazon.com amid high demand for the ... and more » NIKKEI.com Multifaceted Sony Taking On Apple In Online Music Arena NIKKEI.com BERLIN (Nikkei)--Sony Corp. (6758) hopes to catch up to US firm Apple Inc. in the online music distribution business by leveraging its vast group resources, ... and more » Publishers, book lovers find it difficult to adapt to e-books Livemint Sony Corp., which introduced a new line of e-readers on Wednesday, said they were smaller and lighter than before, with clearer text and touch screens, ... and more » Sony (SNE) Takes Aim at Apple iTunes With Streaming Music Service Investorplace.com Sony Corp (NYSE: SNE) likes a good fight and that's just what they're going to get. Just 24 hours after Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: APPL) unveiled their new iTunes ... and more » Sharp to launch 3-D LCD TVs in Europe NewsyStocks.com Competition among 3-D TV makers in Europe is likely to be intense with the entry of Sharp, as Sony Corp. (NYSE:SNE) , Panasonic Corp. ... and more » Call of Duty: Black Ops PS3, Xbox 360 Wager Match Trailer drops Punch Jump (blog) Activision Blizzard Inc. this week released the new Wager Match Trailer for Call of Duty: Black Ops Prestige Edition for Sony Corp. ... and more » Reuters Panasonic aiming for half of Europe's 3D TV market Reuters Panasonic is the world's fourth-largest flat TV maker behind Samsung Electronics Co Ltd, LG Electronics Inc and Sony Corp. Samsung, which was first to ... and more » Sony to enable PS3 3D Blu-ray playback in Oct. Punch Jump (blog) Sony Corp. this week said it plans to enable 3D Blu-ray playback via the Playstation 3 hardware in Oct. Sony in Apr. released a new 3D update to the PS3 ... and more »

DAILY REPORTS

Aug 29 Japan beyond the Ginza Nintendo, Sony, Sega, Canon, Nikon, Toshiba, Toyota, Honda, Mazda, Mitsubishi, Nissan -- these are just some of the brands that helped build Japan's reputation as a leader in cutting-edge technology. But this ancient country is also home to centuries-old traditions, which endure despite the hi-tech revolution that has taken place around them. The contrast between old and new is what makes Japan a truly fascinating country to visit. (Toronto Sun) Aug 26 Fujitsu, Sony stick to 'made in Japan' business model In spite of Japan's rising yen, computer manufacturers Fujitsu and Sony, which have a strong overseas presence, are strengthening their domestic production of high-performance computers. The electronics giants have determined that the power of the "made in Japan" label remains strong for high-performance models competing in design, weight and processing power. They have also concluded that having domestic planning and design divisions will enable them to quickly respond to changes in consumers' preferences -- a key factor in maintaining a competitive edge. (Mainichi) Aug 24 Toshiba to sell 'no-glasses' 3-D TV by yearend Toshiba Corp. will start marketing a 3-D TV that people can watch without wearing special eyeglasses, the first such TV in the world, sources said Tuesday. The company hopes to have the product on sale by the end of this year. Although various major consumer electronics makers have released 3-D TVs, including Panasonic Corp. in April and Sony Corp. in June, critics have complained about the bother of having to wear special glasses. (Japan Times) Aug 19 Sony ordered to pay inventor ¥5 million The Intellectual Property High Court on Thursday ordered Sony Corp. to pay a former employee about ¥5.1 million for inventing a technology used in the PlayStation, reversing a lower court ruling that rejected his demand. Hidehiro Kume, 58, wanted ¥100 million for his invention of a small optical pickup used to play and record data on optical discs for the popular game consoles sold through 2003. (Japan Times) Aug 16 Sony, Panasonic TVs try to hold China line The ambitions of Sony and Panasonic for higher earnings this year depend on convincing Yin Weiguang, a retired construction worker in Beijing, that he chose the wrong television. "I don't really care about fancy features," said Yin, 55, who paid 2,799 yuan (a little more than ¥35,000) for a 32-inch set made by Skyworth Digital Holdings. "I just use it for basic entertainment: watching news, (the) weather forecasts and TV series." Sony and Panasonic, the world's two largest makers of consumer electronics, are slashing some TV prices by a third in China after being outsold six-to-one by Shenzhen-based Skyworth. (Japan Times) Aug 14 How Is 3D TV Doing? Some Data From Japan Think what you want about 3D TV, but it's here already, and we've just seen the beginning. But are people actually buying the devices, as a few dozen models are now available in the US, Japan and other places? The Nikkei, Japan's biggest business daily, recently investigated the 3D TV market in Nippon. What they found out could be of interest for the US and European markets as well. (crunchgear.com) Jul 29 Which Japanese company will win the 3D TV war? 3D television has been touted as the future of the moving image, but so far the technology has been slow to take off. Some of the biggest names in Japan's technology industry report earnings later today and the likes of Panasonic and Sony are betting on 3D to drive sales of new TVs, DVD players and camcorders. Investors will be watching closely as the battle for dominance of the new technology heats up. (BBC) Jul 29 Sony leads Japan's electronics makers back to black Japanese electronics giant Sony on Thursday said it returned to the black in the fiscal first quarter thanks to strong sales in televisions, its PlayStation 3 console and computers. The maker of Bravia televisions and Cyber-shot cameras also upwardly revised its annual profit forecast by 20 percent to 60 billion yen in the year ending March 2011 despite worries over the yen's strength. In the April-June quarter Sony reported a profit of 25.7 billion yen (293 million dollars) compared with a 37.1 billion yen loss a year ago. (AFP) Jul 25 A non-Japanese boss is steering Sony's comeback "The bloody world fell apart," said Sir Howard Stringer, before bursting out laughing on being asked how his turnaround strategy for Sony was going. "I had a bit of a setback. It's called the worldwide recession. I went from record profits to record losses in one year. (That's) what really happened," he chuckled. Stringer, knighted in 1999, is not your average global CEO, especially not in the staid, conventional Japanese business culture. Nor, as his comments show, is he a shrinking violet. But the plain-spoken, charismatic Welshman, who was promoted from head of Sony's US operations to lead the consumer electronics giant, is the man Sony is looking to to save it. (timeslive.co.za) Jul 20 Sharp planning e-book reader Sharp Corp. said Tuesday it will enter the e-book market this year with a device that allows users to read e-book content it plans to distribute in cooperation with newspaper companies and other publishing firms. The multifunctional device will allow users to access video and audio content in addition to text and still images, Sharp said. Sony Corp. and NEC Corp. also plan to release e-book reader devices in the near future. (Japan Times) Jul 17 A Japanese Steve Jobs? Why, asks a Japanese magazine, wasn't the iPad invented in Japan? The short answer would be that Steve Jobs isn't Japanese. Japan does, however, have a similarly hard-driving perfectionist manager in Mr. Tadashi Yanai, head of Fast Retailing, who is rapidly turning his chain of clothing stores, Uniqlo, into a global brand like Sony or Honda. Uniqlo, offering reasonably priced casual ware, has recently opened flagship stores in Paris, Moscow and Shanghai, with plans for overseas sales to surpass domestic revenues by 2015. This year the majority of its 300 new hires were Japanese, while some 100 were from China, South Korea and elsewhere. (Japan Times) Jul 16 Japan's obscure executive rich list In a country where big corporations have only just been ordered to disclose exactly how much their million-dollar earners make, the relatively high pay of Carlos Ghosn and Howard Stringer, the non-Japanese, high-profile heads of Nissan Motor Co. and Sony Corp., caused no little brouhaha. Less well-known: some of their Japanese peers were nipping at their heels in terms of pay. What's more, they don't work for household name auto or tech giants like Messrs. Ghosn and Stringer. Nor do they even pull the strings on some of the world's biggest savings deposits at Japan's mega-banks. Instead, they head up mid-cap manufacturers little known outside their home country. (AFP) Jul 14 All 9 Sony Shop Avic outlets to be shuttered this month Sony Corp. said Wednesday it would close all nine Sony Shop Avic retail outlets in Japan at the end of this month in an overhaul of its sales strategy. The firm's current strategy, which includes managing its own retail shops, was drawn up by Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Howard Stringer in a bid to counter Apple Inc.'s self-branded stores. However, a review has apparently been forced by Sony's failure to reverse the fortunes of Avic Group Corp., the money-losing affiliate that operates the shops. (Yomiuri) Jul 9 Beatles' 'Sgt. Pepper' album cover mystery a piece of Japanese history Who owns the Sony TV that appears on the cover of the Beatles' famous "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" album? The long mystery was recently solved by Yasuharu Muramatsu, 47, curator of Okazaki City Mindscape Museum in Aichi Prefecture. He has an invoice apparently for the TV addressed to Paul McCartney. Released in 1967, "Sgt. Pepper" was recorded after the group returned from performing concerts at the Nippon Budokan arena in Tokyo from June 30 to July 2 in 1966. July 2 marked the 44th anniversary of the Tokyo concerts - the Beatles' only visit to Japan. (Japan Times) Jul 7 More memory, same price for PS3 Sony Corp. will introduce a new model of its PlayStation 3 video game console July 29 that offers more memory at the same price as the previous machine. The company will sell a 160-gigabyte model for ¥29,980, the same price at which Sony had previously offered its 120-gigabyte console, the company said Tuesday. A 320-gigabyte model will sell for ¥34,980. (Japan Times) Jul 1 Sony offers software fix to save melting VAIO computers Sony Corp. said Wednesday it has started providing free software updates to more than half a million users worldwide to fix a glitch that could cause overheating in its popular VAIO laptops. No injuries have been reported, but the Tokyo-based electronics company said it has received 39 problem reports, including 26 in the U.S., with users complaining about the heat and distortion of the shape of their computers, the company said. The problem could affect 535,000 VAIO laptops worldwide, mainly U.S. users but also others in Europe, Japan and the rest of Asia. (Japan Times) Jun 30 Sony says 535,000 laptops at risk of overheating More than half a million Sony laptops sold this year contain a software bug that could lead them to overheat, the company said Wednesday. Sony has recorded 39 cases of overheating among Vaio F and C series laptops that have been on sale since January. In some cases the overheating has led the laptop case to deform. A bug in the heat management system of the BIOS software is to blame. Sony is asking users to either update the software themselves or return their laptops so it can apply the update. (Computerworld) Jun 30 Japan taps foreign managers A wave of strikes in China has prompted Japanese companies operating abroad to finally tap local management, decades after Western peers embraced the strategy of cultivating home-grown expertise. Japan is a late bloomer when it comes to adapting businesses to changing global standards, but recent strikes in China against the country's two largest automakers have been a wake-up call to speed up the process, say experts. Japanese companies have traditionally been reluctant to cede management to foreigners, with the hiring of Howard Stringer at the helm of Sony and Carlos Ghosn at Nissan initially greeted with scepticism. (Straits Times) Jun 26 Studio Ghibli to Make Games Studio Ghibli, the Japanese animation studio that wowed American filmgoers with "My Neighbor Totoro" and the Oscar-winning "Spirited Away," plans to bring its quirky sensibility and style to video games. Ghibli's "Ninokuni," a joint project with the game developer Level-5 of Professor Layton fame, will have its debut on the Nintendo DS handheld console in December and on Sony's PlayStation 3 machine next year. Industry insiders predict it will be a hit in Japan, where Ghibli's "Spirited Away" still reigns as the country's biggest grossing film of all time. (New York Times) Jun 18 Japanese not worried about Stringer's pay After Sony Corp. disclosed its CEO Howard Stringer earned about 410 million yen ($4.5 million) and received stock options for 500,000 shares in the last fiscal year, Japan Real Time hit the streets to see what ordinary people think of his salary. Are they outraged? Angry? Demanding Sony apologizes? Nope, on all three counts. "It's okay," Kazuhisa Hayashida, an accountant in his 30s, said. "It's just for a small number of people. It's nice of him to come to Japan for that money. I hope Japanese executives would come to make as much money [in the future], not just [Nissan CEO Carlos] Ghosn and Stringer." (Wall Street Journal) Jun 15 Nintendo shows off 3D portable game device Japan's Nintendo Co Ltd on Tuesday took the wraps off a new version of its DS handheld device that can play games and show movies in 3D without glasses, as the hardware wars with Microsoft Corp and Sony Corp heat up. The trio that rules the market for gaming devices unveiled at the E3 expo this week nifty new gadgets aimed at widening the global gaming population by drawing in more casual gamers, just as the industry is beginning to recover from a two-year slump. (Reuters) Jun 3 Japan, a land out of ideas Pundits claim Hatoyama's less than nine-month stint ended because of scandals and bickering over U.S. military bases. The truth is, he was done in by a lack of creative thinking. Japan's competitiveness ranking fell to 27th place from 17th in 2009. The thousands of Japanese waiting in line for hours last week for iPads helped dramatize why. Steve Jobs's Apple Inc. isn't killing companies such as Sony Corp. because of high corporate taxes, as many executives say. It's doing so because of a dearth of inventiveness. Hatoyama's departure comes as local media obsess over the "iPad shock," which followed the "iPhone shock" and "iPod shock." (BusinessWeek) Jun 2 Porn stars in 3-D lure consumers to new Sony, Panasonic TVs Porn star Mika Kayama is at the frontier of a push to develop videos and content in Japan that Sony Corp. and Panasonic Corp. need to lure customers for their new 3-D televisions. Kayama and Yuma Asami, the top actresses of adult-movie maker S1 No.1Style, will star in the country's first DVDs for the 3-D format TVs, providing content analyst Yuji Fujimori says can trigger the success of the new sets. Sales of adult videos in Japan were 108.6 billion yen ($1.2 billion) in 2009, representing about 30 percent of the overall video market. (BusinessWeek) May 30 Sony-Google Internet-based TV venture promising, analysts say While the partnership between Sony Corp. and Google Inc. announced last week appears a good match, some industry observers say it remains unclear what kind of business model they are aiming for with the Internet-based televisions they plan to produce. Under the deal, Sony will be the first supplier of the device based on the "Google TV platform," which they say will seamlessly integrate the Internet and television. While several major companies have attempted this in the past, the concept has never really taken off. (Japan Times) May 28 IPad's arrival in Tokyo causes Japanese to reflect First came "iPod shock," which knocked Japan's favorite gadget - the Walkman from Sony, and its line of successors - off its long-held perch at the top of the tech-savvy wish list. Then came "iPhone shock," which sent Japan's cellphone companies - long used to scoffing at the clunky offerings from their overseas peers - scrambling to develop similar smartphones. On Friday, "iPad shock" hit Japan, threatening to bring upheaval to an ever-widening slew of industries in a nation once proud of being on the cutting edge of technology. The hype around the iPad in Tokyo highlights what has become a sobering reality for a country once considered the technological trend-setter; Japan now frequently looks overseas for innovation. (New York Times) [ More... ]