Sony

The prospect of a global economic downturn should make Sony (SNE) nervous. After all, you can't expect consumers to shop for giant flat-screen TVs and other pricey consumer electronics if they're worried about losing their jobs. A drop-off in TV sales would do more than dent Sony's earnings outlook.

It would also dash Chief Executive Howard Stringer's hopes of ending the losses from TVs that have plagued the company's electronics business for several years. But on May 14, the Japanese electronics and entertainment company predicted a big jump in unit sales of flat-screen TVs. The company, which reported full-year earnings, forecast sales of 17 million Bravia liquid-crystal-display sets this fiscal year, which ends in March, 2009.

That would be 70% more (BusinessWeek.com, 5/14/08) than the 10.6 million it sold globally in the year just ended through March 31, and nearly three times what the company sold two years ago. The forecast also beats those of its most formidable domestic rivals. This year, Sharp (6753.T) is expecting to sell 10 million LCD TVs, while Matsushita Electric Industrial (MC) is betting on 11 million Panasonic-brand flat-panel sets (BusinessWeek.com, 4/29/08). LCD TV sales are expected to top 100 million units this year and come within reach of 125 million in 2009, according to iSuppli.

A day after Sony reported earnings, its shares rose 8.7% in Tokyo, vs. an 0.9% rise for the benchmark Nikkei 225 stock average. Since the beginning of the year Sony's shares have lost 16%, compared to the Nikkei index's 3.9% decline. On closer inspection, Sony's TV gains aren't as significant for the bottom line as they might seem at first glance. One telltale sign: Despite rising unit sales, LCD-related revenues this year are expected to stay flat at $1.25 billion. The figure is also 7% less than sales two years ago. Sony executives say they are working to make the division profitable. "The main risk is profitability in LCD TVs near term," Goldman Sachs (GS) analyst Yuji Fujimori wrote in a May 15 report. The combination of higher volumes and lower revenues reflects a harsh reality in the TV business. Until now, companies like Sony, Samsung Electronics, Philips (PHG), Sharp, and Matsushita have been at the cutting edge of producing bigger TVs more efficiently. To do so, they have invested billions of dollars in sophisticated plants that can pump out the giant sheets of specialized glass that are cut to make TVs.

Theoretically, a bigger glass sheet makes more TVs. But they haven't only been competing with each other; they have also had low-cost manufacturers in Asia nipping at their heels (BusinessWeek, 2/26/07). That meant offering discounts so the low-cost brands didn't lure away all but the wealthiest of buyers. It also meant finding new ways of lowering costs so that profits didn't get decimated by rising materials and energy costs and falling TV prices, which have been sinking at a rate of roughly 25% every year. Not many companies have been successful at doing that.

Author:Kenji Hall
date: December 11 2007
site:http://www.businessweek.com/globalbiz/content/dec2007/gb20071211_409881.htm?chan=search

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