Sony moves a step closer to junk; outlook "negative"

I think the financial analysts fail to understand the impact of "riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiidddddddddddddddddge racer."

Hmmm with just alittle bit more research I found out that Toshiba has been down graded to a 'BBB' rating. I suppose that is less than sony's 'BBB+' rating..

Is HD-DVD in danger of destroying the whole company. I doubt it. Same with Sony.

who is the alternative? no one yet...

so sony will survive till there is a viable alternative
unless of course it changes to adapt

financial analysits know jack
just blah on and on and earn millions...
i say shoot them

Methane - get your head out of your ass.

Sony's massive, massive financial woes have been well documented. Why do you think simple PS3 announcements can rock the stock so much? Because Sony is held together by its gaming division. Everything else was losing money hand over fist.

As I said, it's changed, but no other division is massively profitable, most are just eeking by at best.

Ninja,

Sony's market cap is S38.86 Billion
MSFT's market cap is $275.27 Billion

Before you respond, go look up the definition of market cap

As someone who works for Fitch Ratings (in structured finance, but close enough) you can all stop posting about stocks and the stock price. Bonds are totally different (albeit similar) and bond ratings vs stock price are almost irrelevant.

The focus on bonds concerns 1 major factor: Cash flow, and that cash flow's ability to service debt. Think about when you apply for a home loan, all they care about is the job you have and the money you make (along with some other things). So we're concerned about future cash flows and the ability for that to cover debt service.

Stocks have to do with growth potential, which includes cash flow, but also a hundred other factors. Sony could still grow at 15% a year but not have the cash on hand to service debt sufficiently.

And BBB+ is a long way from junk status, keep in mind there are only 10 ratings that are investment grade (AAA -> BBB-).

If I can try and stem the fanboy stock flaming, MS as a company is cash cow that's huge but has little growth potential that's not moving anywher fast, xbox success or not - sony is pretty big too but if you want to gamble on a turnaround you would get much better returns down the line, but hold a higher risk.

Most bonds (NOT STOCKS) are lucky to have a rating that good. A AAA rating only means that it is an institutional grade investment, and pension funds and the like are allowed to invest in it. This is good for the company because it gives them millions of investors that have tons of capital. The lowering of the fund not only means that they get less for the bond, and have to pay out more as coupons, but also, the final payback will be lower. Bonds all turn out to be even in the long run.

Yup...

MS Fanbois = Owned.

Methane47 -

That is hardly a "pw0ned" of any sort. There are two reasons why a company has poor growth potential:

1. The company's market is not saturated and they're not doing well or the market is saturated and they're unable to pull business away from strong competitors (Sony).

2. The company already owns the market and has it saturated along all forms of operation (Microsoft).

Microsoft sits at #2. In their situation, while the stock price itself won't fluctuate up or down, investors are going to begin seeing a larger return on their investment via dividend payments. Microsoft has begun paying out huge payments recently and can sustain some very good numbers over the long term.

Stagnation is not necessarily a bad thing, it all depends on the context. Microsoft's stagnation is because they already have all the customers available in their pocket, and barring a major boost in the living quality in China or India, will be that way for some time. All it means in Microsoft's case is their income is roughly the same every year. The past two years, Microsoft posted a $12 billion profit, meaning no growth, meaning no price hike.

Sony, on the other hand, is in the same situation, but theirs is entirely different. Sony doesn't own the marketplace, and their stock prices are higher mainly because they have far fewer outstanding shares. They, too, have been somewhat stagnant in their income, thus, again, no growth.

To everyone -

Just to supplement what peej said:

What he means by bond costs coming out even in the end is a number of factors. For each bond rating, there is a prevailing Market Rate associated. If a company releases an 8% bond when the market is at 10%, the company will not get the full $1,000 per bond issue (the typical per-bond value), but much less. The company is locked into paying out $80 a year on each bond, even though they only got a smaller cut. When compared to that cut, the annual interest payments plus the final $1,000 face value payment will always end up being the same interest rate as the market the day of issue.

However, this doesn't necessarily mean it isn't a problem. In the case of Sony, if they had begun the bond issue process last month (bond issues take a long time to get to market) and were expecting a certain income from the issue, they're going to be in trouble because of the bond downgrade. By downgrading the bond, Sony is not going to be able to pull the expected cash from the issue and will have to find other ways to make up the shortfall. This means starting another costly bond issue process or taking out another short term loan.

Lets use the above numbers on a 10 year bond, 8% face value, 10%

LaughingTarget-

I think you may be confusing some things, or maybe i'm just not reading your post right...bond pricing is pretty stright forward really - if the market rate was 10% it would be impossible for any company to sell 8% bonds:

Company XYZ's bond rate = market rate (10 year tbill) + risk premium on XYZ

Bond PRICES have other market forces factored into them, but sony could care less about that (short term).

Sony will have a higher risk premium and therefore a higher rate on bonds.

All it means is that they will have a higher interest expense. There are plenty of people who will buy debt at any rating if the price (interest rate) is right, sony will have no problem raising any amount of money they want (but will have a higher %).

DocWho-

sure, sony is "saving" money by not selling PS3's. They'd be "saving" money by not selling PS3's at all. They'd be "saving" money if they threw a DVD drive in it rather than a blu-ray drive, or selling it without an HDD. There is no possible way to swing a lower quantity of units to sell into sony's favor. Why? Because for every day that sony can't get a PS3 on the shelf, that's thousands more 360's that are being sold rather than PS3's. Call me crazy, but I'm pretty sure sony is losing more money in the long run by not selling someone a PS3 at all than they are by selling one at a loss.

funny thing is, my sony shares are up 1.64.
Too bad I only have 13 shares, not enough for a PS3

400,000 units shipping and selling out, at loss of(aprox.) $400 a unit would equal a $160,000,000 loss on a single day, if the launch sells out completely. Add another A$40,000,000 for japanese sales. So if PS# has an insanely succesful launch (which it needs), Sony has posted a one-day loss of $200,000. If they get another 500,000 units into stores before christmas, that's another $200,000,000 loss if they sell out. SO by the end of the year, Sony is nearly a half-billion in the hole with a SUCESSFUL launch. Should Sony deliver even half a million units each month through march, losses will be over a billion on hardware. I stress "on hardware" as I'm sure a lot of you will point out that Sony will make a profit on acessories, which may offset some of these losses. But the PS brand has always had the lowest attach rate for games and accesories compared to, say, the 360. And a more expensive system will mean most can't afford to fully stock up on other stuff.

These are the kind of numbers investors are considering when they decide to put their money somewhere. And yes, this does affect gamers. Didn't Sony take out a huge line of credit to finance PS3 production? Those interest payments don't take care of themselves, and profits from other divisions can only be diverted to prop up gaming for so long. More and more Sony has painted themselves into a corner where they NEED to totaly dominate the next generation to be even a moderately successful player.

I guess its a good thing Sony isnt going to need to borrow money anytime soon, since they are sitting on massive cash reserves.

So many haters on this thread... keep drinking the haterade. Sony has made some huge investments for the future in the last few years, yeah it cost a lot of money to develop a revolutionary new type of processor like the Cell, and a revolutionary new media format like Blu-Ray. Its called an investment in the future, an investment that is about to pay off in spades when Sony dominates both the gaming AND consumer electronics spaces for the next decade.

But if hating on Sony lets you keep up the facade of the Wii's "hidd3n tru pow3r" or 360's "diverse, orginial games catalogue" then by all means. I would hate for anyone to have a coronary after finally pulling their head out of the sand and realizing that Sony has leapfrogged the competition into the Next Generation of gaming and entertainment.

"I guess its a good thing Sony isnt going to need to borrow money anytime soon, since they are sitting on massive cash reserves. "

Wait, Sony has massive cash reserves that aren't showing up on their financial reports? Where's your proof on this? Among other things, given that such reserves would dramatically improve their stock price as well as bond rating, it'd be extraordinarily dumb (and possibly illegal) for them to have unreported reserves.

"yeah it cost a lot of money to develop a revolutionary new type of processor like the Cell"

That's a good point. However, has that paid off? Has there been a massive adoption of the Cell by other tech manufacturers? Not that I've heard. And companies considering using the don't need to see finished PS3s in the marketplace before they make their minds up. They already KNOW what the Cell can do. It sounds like just another chip to me. A very good chip, but not one that's going to revolutionize our entertainment and comunications technology. All that development money has gone into creating a proprietary chip that Sony now has to sell beyond its uses within the company to pay back those development costs, yet another finacial burden for the poor PS3.

32 -

Azn is just making things up, you'll find that guy does it a lot. Yes, it would be entirely illegal to hide those reserves (Sony trades stock on the US market, not sure if Japan has similar reporting rules, but something this big, I'd suspect it to be true), however, it would be unlikely given that companies tend to have a problem with overstating their assets (Enron, WorldCom, etc).

Sony's only has $8 billion in easily liquid finds. Microsoft has $34 billion by comparison.

A reserve is usually defined as cash left over when all of those pesky current liabilities are covered. Sony doesn't have any reserves, but a huge shortfall. $25 billion in short term liabilities, $8 billion in cash. This is like having a $5,000 credit card bill due right now but only having $200 in the bank. No reserves exist in Sony.

If anything, Sony should not be spending any money on anything but absolutely imperative operations, not subsidising product, given what is going on.

Lee -

I was talking face value, sorry I didn't clarify. I don't really have to go on since you know what happens when the face value is below the going market rate.

To everyone else, those bonds will sell for a lot less than what the face value is showing. Fluctuations in the daily market rates cause bonds to sell for more or less than the stated face value, though a credit ratings drop tends to be more than just a fluctuation.

well I don't know if sony's cash reserves show on the balance statement or not - but I've read about them on here numerous times. My point is they won't need to borrow any money anytime soon.

As for the Cell paying off - it just came out, so we haven't seen much adoption yet beyond the PS3, give it some time, there's nothing else on the market so it will take a little while for companies to figure to bring systems using it to market.

aZn_1080p -

They are going to have to borrow. Their cash operations are not going to be able to cover their various yearly expenses, and Sony DOES have other projects. Just because Cell is finished doesn't mean Sony is able to just give up developing new projects.

If Sony DOES stop borrowing money, you can be certain that would be a swan song given the situation they're in, because that would mean Sony has ceased R&D operations. No R&D, no new products. No new products, competition leaves you behind. Competition leaves you behind, you die.

Sony is going to continue to borrow. Can't argue that one.

At this rate Michael Jackson may just get that Sony/ATV catalog all to himself after all.

John Lucas

LMFAO......Microsoft has yet to see a single penny of profit from selling game consoles and peripherals and we all know nintendo has no money (why they are forced to sale last gen hardware and also have to make a profit on every one of their systems they sell). Sony is in a tough spot because of some bad luck that could happen to any big company, but atleast they have seen profit from the gaming side of their business even though they have been selling their systems for a loss. Nobody else can say this !!!!! The PS3 will sell out all over the world and after about a year or two they will once again see profits because once the public realizes how much of a good buy their system is and also how badass it is, everybody will buy it !!

Laughing Target from Msg #19, your post reminds me of when I played SimCity 2000 on the SNES & kept taking out those city bonds. WHEW! Couldn't pay for DEUCE!

A disaster so bad I had to hit reset!

Unfortunately there's no reset button in real life...
John Lucas

"Finally, they caught on. This is what happens when you do not pay attention to your customer's demands. You lose sales! If they don't change their business practice now, they are either (1) going broke or (2) taken out of the competition because they can't afford the loans.

Come on, Sony. All you have to do is find a business strategy that actually works. I know you can do it. Just go for it."

You were right until the end..

What they need to do is RESPECT AND APPRECIATE their customers, not treat them like lemmings and dolts. They've insulted their customers and potential customers so many times over the last year I've lost track. They deserve all this.

7. Has the Sony hatred really come down to business points. Can we no longer find fault with the actually console and upcoming games that we have to start talking about the financial ratings of the Companies bonds. You do realize GM and Ford have terrible bond ratings, but they're still the number one and two car manufacturers in the world. I don't care about their current bond or stock prices because as soon as good sales numbers and software sales role in the door, everyone on Wall Street will change their tone and drive the price back up. At which point, they'll make money on appreciation, just like they are making money from shorting the stock after focusing on rumors to drive the price down. It's the game Wall Street plays and plays well. Analyst don't know anymore about the PS3 then any other gamer, but they just simply have access to influence a larger market. Don't be fooled by wall street and let's focus on the console's offerings.

Posted at 10:46AM on Oct 11th 2006 by DBX00



LOL... GM and Ford ARE NOT the #1 & 2 car makers in the world. Both companies are battling bankruptcy, and have had to continue laying off 1000s and/or closing plants, just to keep afloat. You couldn't have picked 2 worse companies with which to make your comparison.

to #12 DocWho

You're absolutely right, Sony is not losing sales. But Sony IS losing money and positive mindshare.

Every battery replaced is a sale already completed, BUT also a sale costing more than expected, and a drain to positive mindshare.

Every PS3 bought up by people just to sell on EBay is a sale already completed, but a drain to positive mindshare for those who want the PS3 for less than $600 but doesn't wish to line up for days. And a loss of money since the PS3 is meant as a gambit to get into player's homes, instead of wasting space on EBay, while costing Sony money per console sold. (it is unlikely that all EBayers will manage to sell off their stock)

Not selling in one whole region does not lose sales in the total product now, BUT leads to a huge negative mindshare in said region.

since when do a bunch of fanboys know more about investments and company holdings than professionals?
i guess sony fanboys do live in their own world.

fitch ratings is saying that with all thats going on
with Sony (playstation 3 low launch numbers, late arrival in europe, battery recall, lose per unit sold) that the leverage to return the money borrowed is not as great.

sony is losing money, and with current outlook investers dont have the confidence in sony that they had just 3 months ago.

@LaughingTarget and Lee (and a couple other posters, sorry if I forget to mention you)

I would just like to thank you guys for giving the most useful, logical, informative, and, above all, civil posts that I have seen on joystiq in a long time. It is nice to see a dialogue going on wherein the parties concerned actually know what they are talking about, can back it up with facts and solid analysis, and don't jump at eachother's throats at any sign of disagreement.

Like I said, you have been very informative and added much to help readers make sense of the article. I really enjoyed reading your posts, and it cleared a lot of things up...also, as a beginning business student, it was a nice chance to see whether or not I understood all of it, haha.

Thank you.

"funny thing is, my sony shares are up 1.64."

I call bullshit! What, did you JUST purchase them yesterday or something? Check out the 3 month chart. Do you know the stock price has dipped almost $6 since Sony announced their scaled back PS3 launch? What kind of rose colored beer goggles are you wearing?

From #33 - "Microsoft is so cash laden that this time last year they gave out $36 BILLION in a divident, or roughly $132 a share."

Seriously, none of the 40 people that posted afterwards bothered to fact check this? MSFT gave out a $32 billion dividend, which is $3 a share, not quite $132.

bl13 -

Holy crap, you're right. Now I have to go back and see how I jacked up that particular calculation the first time around.

jojo29 -

Valid reason not to make a purchase. However, given that kind of information, the Xbox name is likely to be around longer than the Playstation name. Microsoft is using the Cold War strategy.

Before the first Xbox showed up, Sony was quite content in developing a fiscally sound machine to run its games. They didn't blow the entire company's credit rating just to build the PS or PS2.

Then comes Microsoft. They goaded Sony into a console arms race by tossing out the Xbox and selling it for cut-rate prices. This is a fairly common tactic large companies use when trying to break into a market. Sell a product for far less than an equivelant product goes for. Hyundai did this to bust into the US market. They sold me my Elantra for $12,000 brand new. Yes, Hyundai took some big losses early on, but now they're doing well. Just took them to get the brand name out there.

Sony really is a lot like the former Soviet Union. They were doing alright, not remarkably well, but alright for a while, until we over here in the United States goaded them into races in military and scientific advances. The Soviets were simply in no position to constantly push the envelope and would have been better off plugging along within their means.

Sony's command of cutting edge tech has fallen apart over the 1990's, fueled mostly by the Japanese recession. They found a market they could do well, as long as they managed to keep costs down and sales high. Sony struck gold with the relatively cheap to develop Playstation and Playstation 2.

Sony's strategy of gaming quality of visual quality beat out Microsoft's strategy of massive workhorse. However, Sony didn't believe in its own mantra. Kutaragi apparently saw the Xbox as an attack on his manhood and threw down the gloves and started making deals with the devil to push out the PS3.

We have all agree, the PS3 is nothing like Sony has ever done before. It is entirely cutting edge, developed almost entirely on their own, and it costs a fortune. Even media developments like the CD and DVD were done with considerable help and financial constraint from other companies, and are not as many people think Sony's inventions.

Even after Microsoft proved unquestionably it wasn't the power of the console that made it a hit, but the quality of offerings, they managed to pull Sony into a war it could never win.

Despite being a large corporation, Sony is a midget compared to the juggernaut that is Microsoft. They can easily blow billions a year and never feel an effect on the bottom line. Microsoft's strategy is to destroy Sony afterall, and the PS3 is the result of Microsoft's fruitful efforts.

This is real business. Sony didn't play the game right and stepped onto Microsoft's playing field. Bad move. Don't play the game of someone who fights totally different than you. A boxer should never step in an MMA ring, and an MMA fighter should never step into a boxing ring. They're just going to get dominated on foreign soil.

Sony could have played it smart and not tried to outmuscle Microsoft and we would never even be having this discussion and be playing our PS3's right now. However, Sony made a juvenile mistake and got cocky about their position. Sony wanted to destroy Microsoft, that was Kutaragi's entire goal. This is just like Cuba plotting to invate the USA. It will only end in ruin.

If you want to get irritated at anyone, it should be Sony. They fell for Microsoft's trap like Lowtax fell for Uwe Boll's boxing trick. Sony is a skinny nerd compared to Microsoft, so they need to use tact and cunning to win, but they've been doing nothing more than wasting all of their energy punching at Microsoft's hulking pecs.

This isn't a battle between the PS3 and the 360, Sony made certain of that. It is a battle between Sony and Microsoft, a battle Sony doesn't have the ammunition to win.

Laughing Target - Are you an idiot? Where in the world did you get the idea that Microsoft paid a dividend of $132/share. All of Microsoft's dividends ever paid don't even equal 4 dollars, including the gigantic $3/share dividend in 2005. From wikipedia:

"While the company has had nine stock splits, the first of which was in September 18, 1987, the company did not start offering a dividend until January 16, 2003. The dividend for the 2003 fiscal year was eight cents per share, followed by a dividend of sixteen cents per share the subsequent year. The company switched from yearly to quarterly dividends in 2005, for eight cents a share per quarter with a special one-time payout of three dollars per share for the second quarter of the fiscal year."

Also, for people who think Microsoft is a well run company and a good investment, compare the stock performance against the DJIA over the past 2 years:

http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=MSFT&t=2y&l=off&z=m&q=l&c=%5EDJI

Granted, it's a way better investment than Sony and the company is in great financial shape, but the street isn't so sure they are going to spend their reserve cash as intelligently as other companies and that MS will continue to dominate the IT landscape (or their market cap would be much higher). I'm grateful that they've blown so much money on Xbox, though, as I love Halo and I love my 360. Bring on Assassin's Creed, baby.

Someone should throw LaughingTarget a few more stars for his insights in this topic. It's appreciated to be able to tell that a few people on this site are not teens and have a real education and job.

But LT, I have to tell you, I saw you misspell "ridiculous" as "rediculous" in one of your earlier posts. I've seen it in a few others, too. In your otherwise very excellent (and grammatically correct) posts, I can't believe this was just a typo. Sorry for pointing this out on you. ;)

And Matt, he already admitted he botched a calculation to arrive at the $132/share figure.

@fahmi:

Get your sources right, please, because Ford has bought out: Aston Martin, Jaguar, Land Rover (off BMW), Lincoln, Mercury, Volvo and 33.4% of Mazda (which often enough runs Cosworth engines, or Mazda's own Rotary powered engine). You can't add that to the argument at all. My source for the above is their Wikipedia entry.

The event really killing Sony is the apparent "bad batch" of laptop batteries. If my laptop caught fire on an impulse, I'd be freaking out too. With large computer companies fighting with Sony over the issue, it is obvious that some losses would contribute, from a stockholder's point of view. Any news at this point seems to be bad news, which doesn't look good for Sony.

If I sound like I'm pointing out the obvious, then maybe people should realize that Sony only really cares about #1 lately. This has been like this for years, with MiniDisc, Memory Stick flash memory, and most recent of course, Blu-ray. It's deja vu with Blu-ray: the last major fight was DVD storage standards, Sony and Philips touting MultiMedia Compact Disc, and Toshiba holding onto SuperDensity. Toshiba won, but by adopting 2 modifications used in MMCD... Unfortunately, maybe the same can't be said for HD-DVD and Blu-ray because of Sony's senility and brute force.

Case in point: Blu-ray will make or break Sony right now. I don't think the Playstation 3 even matters for Sony to run as a whole. Ken Kutaragi pushing the PS3 as a "computer" is not a joke, since he's in "computer entertainment". Blu-ray holds the entertainment, so it better work, otherwise, the PS3 is a monsterous waste of matter.

Don't forget that over time the component cost of the PS3 will drop for Sony, as production ramps up and yields get higher. The first thing that happens after a console ships is the engineers start working on a cost-reduced version... the chip count drops like a stone, various component prices drop, and the margin improves (and/or the price can drop). If Sony sells lots of Blu-Ray players and Cell processors, those prices could come down swiftly.

So it's reasonable to see substantial price drops over the next year or two without a huge margin impact.

The real profits on consoles are made on the software. Sony's profits hinge on a high rate of title sales per console, which depends on quality software support. Which remains to be seen...

@Laughing Target

I agree with mostly everything you said LT, but I'm not sure if you're right about MS suckin' Sony into this war, it might be the other way around. I remember Sony first stepping onto MS's toes in regards to media convergence and domination of the living room. This eventually prompted MS to respond with the Xbox, a good counter at that.

However last gen played out, this time MS should go balls out, no pulling punches, sock Sony in the family jewels. Hell, they've got the capital. I would love to see the snobbish, smug faces of Sony fanboys who called the 360 "2006's Dreamcast" or "Xbox 1.5", crushed in despair over their failing console. Chances are it might not play out as dramatically, but hell, I can dream can't I?

For anyone that's been wondering why people have been slating the ps3 and sony so much recently This is one of the reasons - the company makes so many mistakes that their credit/debt rating drops and then the machinations of the market kick in.

If Sony can't pull something fantastic out their butts there's no way they can be financially viable enough to compete properly this 'next' gen. People won't buy into a company that's slipping, and MS will run rings around Sony - nintendo are in a space of their own, raking it in.

It's not MS fanboyism, it's not bias, it's the simple fact that Sony are absolutely killing themselves and the market/gamers/consumer will suffer for it in the long run. I'd rather see a strong ps3 which will bode well for gaming on the whole, atm i see a 'dreamcast'.

Lets not forget something that can really hurt Sony in the recent future as well. The NEC chips.

For those who don't know NEC has come out with a chip that can supposedly handle both blu-ray and HD-DVD. So what does that mean for Sony's plan for saturating the market with Blu-ray players that will become the next step in the medium? It will wash down the tube.

"Every gamer knows Nintendo hardware quality is 1st rate. Nobody can say the same for Sony products."

Spoken like a true N-loyalist.

Of course, nevermind the cracking DS Lite hinge, the godawful plasticky nightmare that was the Phat, etc.

While I haven't had any reliability issues with DS units myself, saying 'nobody can say the same' for a Sony product is pure Sonyhater tripe. My first-run PSP imported from Japan 12/04 has never so much as hiccuped after almost two years of fairly regular use, a few drops onto hard surfaces and getting mauled by my nieces.

Get off this Mac fanatic style kick, N-freaks. Nintendo isn't Apple, the Whee isn't an iPod or Powerbook.

And Vlad, no matter how many spittle-spattered anti-Sony blogs you write, they're not going anywhere. Sorry.

"You do realize GM and Ford have terrible bond ratings, but they're still the number one and two car manufacturers in the world."

You do realize that you're wrong, right?

General Motors may be the number one car company in the world, due to the massive amount of different companies under their umbrella, but Ford is not second, they're fourth... behind DaimlerChrysler and Toyota.

Facts are fun.

"And Vlad, no matter how many spittle-spattered anti-Sony blogs you write, they're not going anywhere. Sorry."

If you think that posting a factual report about a company's debt moving towards junk status is "spittle-spattered anti-Sony," then you're just a moron.

But then again, fanboys do often view negative facts as being indicative of an anti-whatever bias. Pathetic.

I hate to say it, but if they don't get their company in order quick, sony is going to be in the history books for good.

I love sony and would like to see them make a come back. but sony is at walmart now, come on walmart!!!!!!!!!!

their recievers began to suck like 5 years ago with all that speaker protection,and crappy , limiting sales there.

and now blu-ray.. here we go all over again with betamax and vcr, divx and dvd , now hd-dvd and blu-ray why don't they just leave the standards alone .. .damn!!!

mass over hall and quick....

Is it true that the Sony gaming devision (PS2,games,etc) generated HALF of Sony's total revenue/profit at one point? I remember reading something like that somewhere. Not sure if it's true though. If it is, this PS3 project is VERY risky. I hope they have a good plan.