Sony Corporation is Japan based multinational company, it was founded on 7th May, 1946. Headquarter of the company is located in Tokyo, japan. Sony Corporation operates in multiple industries, multiple segments of company includes; home entertainment and sound, Pictures, digital imaging products and solutions, mobile communications, games and network services and music. Sony is one of the leading company in electronic industry. The core competitor of Sony in electronic industry are; Samsung, LG electronics and TCL. In 2013, Sony Corporation was named as the 4th largest manufacturer of television; LG, Samsung, Nikon, canon and TCL are the main competitors of the company. Sony Corporation manufactures broad range of product lines, corporation had manufactured and sold each and every electronic products, since primitive technological epoch till modern technological age. 1980-1990. Corporation produced and sold the following products; Walkman, radio, castes, camcorders, dvds, video tapes and audio tapes. Most of the products mentioned was the innovation of Sony. Corporation was invincible during 1980-1990, every product manufactured by the company was perfection, which made the company market leader in electronic industry. Sony is market leader in console games industry its console games product line under brand name PlayStation, holds the highest market share followed by, Xbox (Microsoft console game product line) and Nintendo.
BCG matrix is developed by Boston based private consulting firm, for the conglomerates like Sony which comprises of diversify divisions or segments. BCG matrix is one of the tools for top level managers, which can be used to formulate strategies for each segment according to its need. This framework is the four quadrant graph each quadrant represent different category of segment, according to its market share and industry growth rate. Following are the four components of the matrix; Question Mark, Cash Cow, Stars and dogs.
Question Mark
Question Mark is one category of segments amongst the four in BCG framework, which includes, those segments which have low relative market share and operates in high sales growth industry. Sony mobile communication division comes under the category of Question mark. Smart phone industry is growing each year but unfortunately, Sony product line of smart phone manufactured under the brand name of Xperia lagged behind in competition. Sony Xperia is not making half of sales compare to Apple iPhone. Company have to work on product development, if Sony wants to stay in smartphone industry it should formulate product development strategy for the mobile communication segment.
Stars
The second component of BCG Matrix is stars. Stars includes those segments, which compete in high sales growth industry and have high relative market share. Sony electronics division can be included into the category of stars. Sony is the fourth largest manufacturer of televisions in the world, sales of Sony televisions are quite impressive and Sony is also third largest producer of digital camcorders. In console games PlayStation brand has highest market share therefore, game and network segment of Sony can also be included into the category of stars.
Cash Cows
Those segments can be included into this category, which operates in low sales growth industry and have high market share. Home entertainment segment comes into the category of cash cows. Entertainment unit produce drama series and films and Sony studio was ranked third in entertainment industry in 2011, with 12.5% market share in box office. Sony entertainment have produced many famous movies like, karate kid, spider man and men in black 3. Sony music entertainment is the world 2nd largest music record company. Company holds the partial or full rights of some of the famous musician records like usher, Michel Jackson and Eminem.
Dogs
Those segments are included into the category of Dogs, which operates in low sales growth industry and have low relative market share. Sony computing segment come into the category of dogs, company lunched its laptops under the brand of VAIO but failed to satisfy the needs of customer and there were many flaws in the product, therefore company failed to grab the market share in computing industry. For such segment retrenchment and liquidation strategy is recommended by BCG matrix.
References
Sony’s mobile business is now small enough to not be losing money. Retrieved from.
http://www.theverge.com/2016/7/29/12320782/sony-mobile-business-earnings-q1-2016
Global unit sales of current generation video game consoles from 2008 to 2016 (in million units). Retrieved from.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/276768/global-unit-sales-of-video-game-consoles/
Sony Q1 2016 Earnings – Gaming & Media Up, Electronics Flat, and Components Down. Retrieved from.
http://www.sonyrumors.net/personalaudio/
Annual Report. Retrieved from.
https://www.sony.net/SonyInfo/IR/library/FY2015_20F_PDF.pdf
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