Yesterday, I viewed Sony as a brand name that was worth the price. Today, I wonder if Sony is wasting away in a place called Sonyville, a small imaginary island in the South Pacific. It’s a land filled of yesterday’s achievements and devoid of today’s reality. It’s a land with tall buildings, smart people and smart titles. It’s a land that took decades to build and just maybe, it’s a land with many similarities to GMville.
I’ve written about GM many times and it was and is a corporation filled with silent problems. Today, I’m inclined to believe that Sony could follow suit. In the past year, i found their customer service to be terrible. Their products are nothing special. And companies like Apple are gaining market share.
Could it be that Sony is wasting away in Sonyville, and silent problems are at the center of their universe?
I wrote these words back on July 8th - some four months ago. This is what Reuters wrote about Sony and their dismal outlook last week.
“What we’re seeing is a weakening of Sony’s brand power. That’s especially clear in North America where its market share has fallen sharply. The situation is so bad it almost makes me want to cover my eyes,” said Chibagin Asset Management’s advisor Fujio Ando.
“They no longer have products that are unique and can control the market,” he said.
If that isn’t a wake up call, it should be. Because today, Sony is a company with grand ideas of how the world is and how it should be. If the world aligned with that vision, Sony would be the No 1 electronics company in the world. Instead, the world has changed, and Sony is growing increasingly irrelevant. They’re an organization filled with Silent Problems as I’ve detailed in my book, Without Warning. Over the years their products have become commoditized, yet have retained the overhead of an innovation company. Rather than being a step ahead of their competition, they’re now a step behind .
Yes, Sony certainly appears to be wasting away in Sonyville.
