Sony reported its third quarter results for the three months ending 31 December 2017, and once again it was not pretty reading for the mobile division. Sony trimmed full year expectations once again, now expecting to ship 14 million units for FY 2017 (year ending 31 March 2018). This is a decrease of 1.5 million units from the prior quarter, where Sony estimated it would ship 15.5 million units in the year.
Sony Mobile shipped 4.0 million Xperia handsets during the quarter, a decline of 22 percent from the prior year. Operating income for the segment declined 25% to 15.8 billion yen, reflecting the lower number of handsets sold and higher component pricing.
For the full year, Sony is anticipating the mobile division to reach sales of 710 billion yen (against 759 billion yen last year), while operating income is expected to halve from 10 billion to 5 billion yen. Sony says it expects to reach this operating income, by offsetting the lower unit sales with a reduction in operating costs.
We’d love for Sony to report some unit sale growth at some point. For so long now, we have been used to Sony keep cutting its mobile numbers. Hopefully, Sony’s new flagship range which will launch at MWC 2018 will be that catalyst.
