Sony boosted by the games division

1:46 am PDT the 31/10/2018

by

Gavin J. Blair

Driven by PlayStation 4, the video game industry has outperformed the image, music, and consumer electronics divisions.

When Sony Corp. recorded record quarterly profits of $ 2.1 billion and again raised its full-year forecast on Tuesday, thanks in large part to the continued success of its PlayStation 4 (PS4) business.

Despite the fact that the PS4 is almost five years old and should approach the end of its life cycle – not to mention the fact that some predicted that console games would be threatened by the rise of smartphones – games accounted for nearly 40% of all games. benefits of Sony.

The PS4 has now sold more than 85 million units and has more than 34 million subscribers to its PS Plus online service. House titles Spider Man and God of the war, which bring more money to the company than third-party games, set sales records and help propel software sales to more than $ 75 million quarter-over-quarter, while it also sells 3.9 million more consoles.

The gaming division reported profits of more than $ 800 million in the second quarter, up 65% and more than the total image, music and consumer electronics divisions that contributed to Sony Corp.'s net income. Two-thirds of this amount came from network services: online gaming sales and subscription fees.

The traditionally strong end-of-year quarter announces itself as another good quarter for the PS4 and Sony, with Rock Star Games & # 39; Red Dead Redemption He recorded sales of $ 725 million in the first three days of release – the kind of numbers that movie studios can only dream of. Although this is shared between the PS4 and Microsoft's Xbox One, the majority will be on Sony's best-selling console.

Sony has raised its earnings forecast for the full-year gaming sector to 310 billion euros, or $ 2.74 billion at current exchange rates, which has allowed it to increase its overall forecast profit for the year. Fiscal year to 2018 March, to 870 billion or 7.6 billion dollars.

Investors reacted to these figures by sending Wednesday in Tokyo a 4.75% increase in Sony's stock to 6,140 ($ 54.23). This puts Sony about 40% at the same time last year.