Sony's Value Chain Analysis For Sony

Japan is the home to of the top companies in the world. One of the companies, which has helped Japan’s economy to be one of the top, is Sony. Modern day Sony is a high profit high output company, which is manly due to its marketing strategies and decision to its customers.

Sony Corporation is a Japanese owned company, created in 1946 based in Tokyo, Japan. The company competes in the technology market with diversity. This includes video games, computers and computer hardware, television, media players, etc. With that being said, Sony has had their ups and downs over the past few years, just like everyone else in this industry. Things such as the U.S. economy can really affect the future of this company. Now that the economy is on the downfall, things such as entertainment are not as important as paying for food, gas, and other bills. It is important to realize these things as you analyze the company due to the fact that the company

To regain some of its market share in its “growth driven” and “stable profit generators” sectors, Sony can reposition its competition in the minds of consumers. For instance, Sony can use comparative advertising to demonstrate that its brands are superior to its competitors. In this situation, Sony can attempt to alter the portrayed image of its competitor, Nintendo, and position its PlayStation game console as the better-quality product (Positioning(marketing), n.d).

With all these elements concerning the gaming industry. PlayStation 4 continue to outsell its competition. Which is the Xbox One as well is the Xbox 360 and the Nintendo. In turn makes it the number one gaming console worldwide. Sony has committed to cultivating it's gaming system for the next generation to enjoy the product. Sony PlayStation 4 has no pressure with it status in the gaming industry with it significant prices, and design. With gives reasoning to buy the console.

In order for the strategy to be successful it should realistically assess the company’s internal resources. An internal analysis is used to identify the strengths of the company and identifies the weakness to overcome in the strategy. The internal analysis will help with understanding the internal issues that exist at StilSim by evaluating a value chain analysis, a resource analysis, core competencies and a stakeholder analysis.

Value chain is the ability to take a product and add some value along the way to make it appealing to the customers in such a way that they be willing to buy the product at a certain price. Many companies in today’s business world analyze their value chains to identify the ways which continue to attract their customers. The value chain analysis consist of two parts, primary activities and secondary activities. The first ones support the actual physical process of buying, manufacturing, shipping and selling the product and the secondary activities are actions that support the process, such as procurement, technical support and human resource management.

Value chain is the ability to take a product and add some value along the way to make it to appeal to the customers in such a way that they be willing to buy the product and pay the asking price. Many companies in today’s business world analyze their value chains to identify the ways which continue to attract their customers. The value chain analysis consist of two parts, primary activities and secondary activities. The first ones support the actual physical process of buying, manufacturing, shipping and selling the product and the secondary activities are is actions that support the process, such as procurement, technical support and human resource management.

Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo have been competing for a decade with Sony dominating the market throughout most of the years because of their superior technological products. The video games industry faces an entirely new rivalry situation. In 2008, Sony lost its strong position on the market, because of Nintendo’s success with their dynamic Wii over Sony’s high-tech PlayStation 3 and Windows’ Xbox 360. Although the Wii was technologically much less advanced than PS3 and Xbox 360, the Wii's cheaper price, ease of use, innovative motion-sensitive controller, and simple but fun games, made the console a hit all demographics from 9 to 65 years old, male and female. All these factors resulted in Nintendo’s Wii dominating sales and surpassing Sony’s by an impressive ratio of 2:1.

Value chain analysis looks at every step a business goes through, from raw materials to the eventual end-user. The goal is to deliver maximum value for the least possible total cost. It is a systematic approach to examining the development of competitive advantage. The most basic breakdown of primary functions includes inbound logistics, operations, outbound logistics, sales and marketing and service. People should use the other models and frameworks within this software to further differentiate between, and add to, these domains. Product Innovation is one area that is not normally included in the de jure model but is often included in the de facto model. Value Chain Analysis describes the activities that take place in

Overall, the market response to these three consoles has been surprising. Nintendo Wii, has outsold its rivals and more surprisingly, Sony’s PS2 has outsold PS3. This has let Microsoft and Sony with the enormous challenge of competing with a rival possessing two key advantages: a lower cost console and a product with a sound response in the market.

Nintendo appears to have implemented a market-penetration pricing strategy. The Wii at a cost of $250 is 50% less than the 20-gigabyte PS3 (smaller hard drive machine). At this lower price, it is easier for the product to penetrate the market due to affordability in most segments. This aligns with the assumed company’s aim of maximising market share in the current and new segments. To achieve this, Nintendo ensured that the Wii was less costly to manufacture. Moreover, a higher sales volume may lead to lower unit costs and higher long run profits. Conversely, Sony is believed to have a market-skimming pricing strategy. The company invested $2 billion in technology, so this strategy aims at recovering the maximum amount of revenue to cover the high costs incurred in the early stages of the product life cycle. Additionally, Sony has a strong brand due to the success of their previous machines (PS2 and playstation) and the high price assists in communicating the image of a superior product with quality.

According to the article, Sony 's semi biz to pivot from vertical to horizontal, Sony plans to keep its research and development teams running strong, but will outsource key manufacturing processes. Even if outsourced, game processors will continue to be one of Sony 's main semiconductor products. The company intends to boost all the investment on Cell processor from the game business. Sony has invested a total of 460 billion yen (about $3.8 billion) on semiconductors over a three-year period. Of this amount, 200 billion yen ($1.7 billion) was spent on the Cell processor.

Way back then, Sony entered the market originally as a supplier of components for Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) home console. However, when Nintendo failed to introduce new technologies that would improve the gaming experience, Sony grabbed the chance to seize the opportunity. Sony

I recently entered a sector of the home entertainment market by purchasing a Playstation 3. The Playstation 3(PS3) is Sony Computer Entertainment’s third video game console which competes in the current seventh generation of consoles alongside Microsoft’s Xbox 360 and Nintendo’s Wii.

Sony has a strong reputation on the domain of digital and audio technology. However, Sony was a marginal player in the handset industry with 2% of market share. Previous attempts to enter the US and European markets both failed due to poor knowledge on mobile technology. Sony was too slow to move away from its traditional businesses such as music stereos, televisions, VCR and DVD, hence a partner who could provide expertise knowledge was needed.