Sony apologises for global battery recall

Sony executives in Japan today apologised for a massive global recall in laptop batteries, but said the problems were now fixed and none of the company’s top leaders would resign over the recall.

Sony said improvements in production, design and inspection had been made to prevent a recurrence of any laptop overheating problems, which company officials said were caused by microscopic metal particles that mistakenly got inside the battery, causing short-circuiting.

The Japanese electronics and entertainment company said its top management, including Chief Executive Howard Stringer and President Ryoji Chubachi, would stay on at the company and make the successful completion of the recall of nearly 10 million batteries a priority.

“We would like to take this opportunity to apologise for the worries,” said Sony corporate executive officer Yutaka Nakagawa.

Sony has maintained that the short-circuiting happens only very rarely and only when the battery is connected in a certain way or if the laptop is used improperly and gets bumped around.

Sony officials today said that only one overheating problem was confirmed among 3.5 million batteries, although the company declined to comment on problems reported by other laptop makers.