Sony's Kaz Hirai took the stage at the Sony E3 keynote to reveal the new PSP Go!, but he also had some things to say about longterm development for the PSP platform. Kaz mentioned that Sony would be making it easier for developers to create titles for the handheld by cutting the cost of PSP development 80%. Hopefully, that will mean more developers flocking to the system making great games for us to play.

President and CEO of SCEI, Kaz Hirai, knows all too well the financial troubles plaguing Sony's Computer Entertainment division. SCEI posted an operating loss of ¥58.5 billion ($612 million) for fiscal 2008 and Sony admits it doesn't expect to turn a profit any time soon. But that's not going to stop Hirai from trying to change things. No, according to what he told Japan Today, it sounds like he already has a plan: "We need to quickly bring our PlayStation business on a break-even level and later to profitability."

So, he's laid out a set of milestones to accomplish, but how's SCEI going to get there? Hirai said Sony needs "a strategy where buying a [sic] hardware is not the endpoint but instead a starting point that can offer new experiences." This includes, according to him, bringing the PlayStation Network to traditionally non-gaming electronics like televisions and digital cameras -- shades of what Howard Stringer said weeks before. And speaking of PSN, part of the strategy is aimed at boosting digital sales from ¥20 billion ($209 million) last year, to ¥50 billion ($523 million). We guess this means expect a lot more content spread across a lot more devices.

[Via Kotaku]

Like two lovers caught in a seductive tango, chief executive Howard Stringer has taken the lead as president of Sony's electronics division, taking on a more intimate and hands-on role with the company's future. The previous president, engineer-turned-exec Ryoji Chubachi, will undertake a new role as vice chairman and stay on to assist Stringer. This recent move is part of Sony's attempt to manage the huge losses the company has suffered recently. The reorganization doesn't stop there, oh no, Sony is really shaking things up.

The company is forming two new divisions, one of which will oversee PlayStation and Vaio PCs, while the other takes charge of Bravia TVs, Cybershot digital cameras, and Handycam camcorders. The man in charge of the new PlayStation and Vaio division is none other than Kaz Hirai, head of Sony's gaming business. Heading up the other division will be Hiroshi Yoshioka, who currently oversees Sony's TV business.

On the video game side of things, one of the opportunities presented by this restructuring will be the expansion of PSN beyond the realm of games. Sony wants to offer real network-based content that works across all Sony devices, including its game consoles, Walkman brand, and even the e-Reader. With Sony reorganizing all of its divisions, the prospect of SCE having greater access to other divisions in the company becomes higher. This leaves the possibility of new synergistic ideas within Sony, such as PSN on your cell phone or an MP3 store for PSP. This corporate shuffle will allow Sony to be the "united company" it has been telling us it will be ... for years.

Source - Stringer adds president post in shake-up [Via Edge]
Source - Strategy Analytics: Sony Brings Down Silos To Address Connected Consumer Opportunities

It's charming to see that no matter how high up you are on the gamer ladder, you can still be goaded into a flame war. Sony Computer Entertainment boss Kaz Hirai discounted the Xbox 360's longevity and chance at market dominance yesterday, and now Xbox boss Aaron Greenberg has rushed right into the fray, saying, "That complacent attitude is out of touch with where the industry and consumer is today." You say out of touch, Aaron, we say "big thinking."

But, still unmollified, he told The Bitbag, "I can't imagine any scenario where the PS3 can catch up with us. In fact, even if you doubled the current PS3 sales and Xbox 360 remained flat, they couldn't close the gap until 2014."

Meanwhile, Nintendo's Reggie Fils-Amie reportedly made an ear trumpet out of $100 bills and shouted, "What? Can you two speak up?" Though the involved parties emitted nary a chuckle, we thought it was a hoot.

Sony's Kaz Hirai must be off his meds, because he's talking like the PS3 is the one out there selling like hotcakes. Okay, we'll concede that Russia may be more receptive to your products, but on a global scale, the sales figures aren't even comparable. So, what gives?

"This is not meant in terms of numbers, or who's got the biggest install base, or who's selling most in any particular week or month, but I'd like to think that we continue official leadership in this industry," he said. Uh, okay, well how would you measure leadership other than success? In terms of Nintendo and their competition with Sony, Kaz had more bizarre things to say. "It's difficult to talk about Nintendo, because we don't look at their console as being a competitor," he said. "They're a different world, and we operate in our world - that's the kind of way I look at things."

Kaz is, uh, quite delusional, if we may say so. Relax, Kaz. At least you have your PS2 sales to lean on. No need to create fantasy worlds for your mind to live in.

[Via Go Nintendo]

Sony and the PS3 have taken their lumps in the media recently, but leave it to Kaz Hirai to stand by the big black box even in the toughest times: Hirai recently told Official PlayStation Magazine that in order to describe the 360, he needed a single word that meant "lacks longevity."

But even that semi-burn wasn't enough to appease the Hiraicane's appetite for destruction. He added, "Unless things go really bad, there's no way that at the end of a life cycle our competition is going to have a higher install base."

OK, so maybe he's not providing any actual justification for his claims, but it's still nice to see that Sony still has fight in them.

Let's not take the subject line without some context, okay? Kaz Hirai stated that Home will truly resonate with consumers and they will love its online services. In that respect, its release date really doesn't matter. He said in an interview with MCV: "I'd much rather make sure we take the time to have a great service rather than rush something into the market ... If we have the right service, it doesn't matter when we launch – so long as it's in a reasonable timeframe." That said, Home is still scheduled to launch this Fall.

Kaz Hirai, Sony Computer Entertainment's "Big Boss," tells MCV that the company is taking its sweet time to make Home. Hirai explains that if Home is good, it won't matter when it launches, "so long as it's in a reasonable time frame." By our estimates, "reasonable time frame" left a while ago on a trip around the world and, if we think in a circular fashion, should bang back around sometime soon.

Hirai goes on to say that if the competitors decide to follow what the company is doing with Home, it would be their prerogative -- we're sure Linden Labs is thinking the same thing about Home. Anyway, Hirai is "confident" that the Home open beat is something that'll "resonate" with consumers.

Kaz Hirai, the President and CEO of SCEI, told the Financial Times in an interview that some of his ardent goals for the PS3. "It's not fun for me replicating the PS2 numbers. I've seen that movie already, I want to try to see if we can exceed the PS2 numbers after nine years, otherwise why are we in this business?"

This echoes earlier comments made by David Reeves, President of SCEE. The PS1's lifetime sales were 102 million units, while PS2's lifetime sales are currently at about 140 million units. The PS3's lifetime sales 20 months into its life is about 13 million, and Sony expects to sell another 10 million units by the end of the current fiscal year.

So ... lofty goals or realistic expectations? Keep this in mind for comparison purposes: by March 2002, about 26 months after the Japanese launch and 19 months after the American launch, Sony shipped 30 million units of the PS2. Read the entire article here.

As many Sony fans know, the PlayStation 3 hasn't exactly been a financial success for Sony quite yet. Every console sold has not necessarily led to profits for the company, but that trend is to change soon if you believe what Sony head honcho Kaz Hirai had to say. He believes that overall PS3 operations will start to bring in a profit by the end of this fiscal year -- that's the end of March, 2009.

Keep in mind "overall" PS3 operations means more than simply selling the console. This means peripherals, software, and downloadable titles will contribute as well. It might not seem like something important to the gamer population, but unless the PS3 can do this, shareholders and other decision-makers may start to question the longevity of the console. We're not worried, though.

Sony Computer Entertainment's president of worldwide studios, Shuhei Yoshida, isn't blind to the fact that exclusive games are becoming a rarity these days. In an interview with UK blog ThreeSpeech, the man who replaced Phil Harrison says that, given the trend towards multi-platform releases of major titles, first-party studios and games become "more important" – and that Sony is focusing its assets internally.

Yoshida echos much of what we've been hearing from Sony over the past few months with regards to exclusives, stating that "in this generation, it costs much more to develop one product." This results in what he says is "pure economic pressure" that has caused "most of the third parties to move from some exclusive titles to more multi-platform titles."

"Because we know that is the trend, we, as a company, can invest in our first-party studios," says Yoshida, who is relocating to Japan as his division is set to play an ever more integral role in PlayStation's future success. Collaborating more closely with SCEI prez Kaz Hirai, Yoshida says he'll be working "not only to create games, but to participate in the overall direction-setting of our company and our future platforms." Future platforms? Let's just focus on exclusive, first-party titles for those present platforms of yours for now, 'kay?

[Via CVG]

Capping off the plethora of good information from Sony Computer Entertainment CEO Kaz Hirai's business briefing, White Knight Story (known in Japan as Shirokishi Monogatari) is expected to arrive during Sony's Fiscal Year 2008, which is the period between now and April 2009. We haven't heard much about Level 5's epic since its showing at Tokyo Game Show in September 2007. Here's hoping we see more at next month's E3 Media and Business Summit.

The other titles listed were already confirmed for FY08: MotorStorm: Pacific Rift (this Fall), Killzone 2 (February 2009), Resistance 2 (this Fall), LittleBigPlanet (October 2008), AFRIKA (August 28 for Japan) and Secret Agent Clank (already out in North America, due next month in Europe).

[Via PS3 Fanboy]

Source (Warning: PDF link)

Sony has already launched a video on demand service with the Korean PS3. The service would compete with, among others, Microsoft's Xbox Live Video Marketplace, which launched November 2006. We can't help but wonder, given rumors and advertisements, if "movie downloads" translates to general video downloads (TV, movie, etc.). We'll find out more next month.

[Via Engadget]

A long time ago, Jack Tretton mentioned that Sony will not pay for PS3 exclusivity in this generation of games. "We have a very different approach to exclusives than some of our competitors. We don't buy exclusivity. We don't fund development. We don't, for the lack of a better term, bribe somebody to only do a game on our platform," he noted. Instead, Sony tries to seduce developers to make better games on the system, and use the appeal of the PS3 hardware to secure exclusives.

This strategy has meant a bevy of formerly PS2-exclusive series to become multiplatform successes on Xbox 360 and PC. However, Kaz Hirai told ThreeSpeech "that's something that we can re-evaluate." High-profile exclusives act as differentiating reasons for system purchases. PS3 has a strong first-party line-up, but it will need to pursue third-party exclusives with an even stronger bite. However, with games being so expensive in this generation, such a proposal may be difficult. "It's also something that the publishers need to make a business decision on. Ultimately, it becomes a dialogue – if it makes sense for them to go exclusive, that's a business decision that they need to make. But generally speaking, because of the investments that publishers need to make in this round of hardware, it's going to be more difficult for publishers to make that decision."

It appears Sony is getting excited -- Kaz Hirai made a statement recently boasting the PS3's upcoming success this generation. Overtaking the Wii and Xbox 360 is within Sony's grasp, when looked at through the telescopic lens of the "ten year life cycle". In a video interview with the BBC, he talks up this point as well as some of the trials and tribulations of creating the PS3, the launch, what's to come later this year, and challenges or hurdles he expects Sony and the PS3 to overcome in the near future. It's pretty interesting to watch a sit down chat with Kaz, so be sure to check it out and let us know your opinions.