Sony to cut 10,000 jobs on record profit loss

Japanese electronics maker, Sony announced it is to axe 10,000 jobs after four straight years of losses.

Annual profit at Sony was less than half of what analysts estimated as television and game sales slumped.

Net income in the year ending Mar 31 may be €291m, the Tokyo-based firm said in a statement yesterday.

Sony’s television business will lose €775m this year, chief financial officer Masaru Kato said.

Kazuo Hirai, who took over as chief executive last month, is eliminating about 6% of the workforce after losing customers to Samsung and Apple.

Mr Hirai is turning to mobile devices, games and digital imaging to revive Sony, which has lost about 90% of its value since 2000 while failing to deliver trend-setting products like the Walkman.

“It’s still not clear how Sony can post this profit,” said Ichiro Takamatsu, a fund manager at Bayview Asset Management, which manages $2bn.

“It needs something really innovative, but that won’t just pop out all of a sudden.”

Sales this year may be €71.7bn, the company said, compared with the €65.7bn average forecast by analysts.

Sony predicts selling 17.5m televisions this year, down from 19.6m last year, according to the statement. Compact-camera sales will remain little changed at 21m units, while game-console sales may drop to 16m units from 18m units, Sony said.

The company’s shares fell 1.2% to 1,213 yen (€11.70) in Tokyo trading yesterday, extending the losses this year to 12%.