Sony 2010 Annual Report Download - page 7

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We entered fiscal year 2009 (the year ended March 31,
2010) with the daunting challenge of restoring Sony to
profitability following the prior year’s substantial operat-
ing loss, and bringing about change that would not only
sustain consistent profitability, but would deliver growth
opportunities and new user experiences to customers
in order to further enhance Sony and its brand.
Much has changed over the past year, brought about
by the efforts and perseverance of the management
team and the entire Sony Group, unified in common
purpose, in the face of the most challenging global busi-
ness environment in a generation. The year began with
the implementation of fundamental changes in our orga-
nizational structure and processes. Our core electronics
and game businesses were reorganized in order to better
respond to both the increasingly competitive market
landscape, as well as our increasingly savvy customers.
The Consumer Products & Devices Group brings
together our traditional and vital hardware, including
televisions, digital cameras and video cameras, as
well as our key devices including image sensors and
batteries. This group was established to enhance
product competitiveness and improve operations in
order to generate and sustain profitable growth.
The Networked Products & Services Group is com-
prised of our game business, VAIO™ personal computers,
other networked mobile products and our network ser-
vices. The mandate of this group is to accelerate inno-
vation of our networked products and services to deliver
4
new and exciting user experiences to our customers.
Key to our new structure are three horizontal
platforms—the Global Sales and Marketing Platform, the
Manufacturing, Logistics, Procurement and CS (Cus-
tomer Service) Platform, and the R&D and Common
Software Platform—which have enabled us to stream-
line operations, accelerate decision making, boost
efficiency and reduce costs.
These changes were designed to transform Sony
into a more agile, competitive and successful company,
one that is in tune with the needs and desires of today’s
global, digitally savvy and interconnected consum-
ers. They were also intended to enhance our ability to
pursue opportunities in new markets aggressively and
to integrate content, software and services with our
hardware successfully, to deliver rich and seamless enter-
tainment experiences that differentiate us from competitors.
While our reorganization is a vital part of our transfor-
mation going forward, we also needed to attack our cost
structure immediately and urgently and secure a better
financial footing. Our swift and wide-ranging actions will
help enable us to fund the innovation required to drive
our future growth.
Specifically, we undertook the difficult but necessary
task of reducing headcount and closing or consolidating
eleven manufacturing sites worldwide*1, and we have
announced plans for further reductions. With the new
management team driving quick decisions in these and
other areas, I am pleased to report that we beat our
Letter to Shareholders: A Message from Howard Stringer, CEO
Sony’s Transformation
*1 Closed or consolidated between December 2008 and March 2010