Sony Responds To Crashing Sales with Management Shift

ps3Sony Computer Entertainment Europe has made some leadership changes in response to their in-ability to get things going in the sales department of the PlayStation 3. Gamer’s continue to refuse to believe the PlayStation 3 is in a bad situation by explaining how badly Microsoft’s Xbox 360 is doing in Japan and Europe compared to the Sony console. And, of course, the Wii isn’t competition to Sony.

“Andrew House, Chief Marketing Officer and Group Executive of Sony Corporation, has been named President, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and Co-Chief Operating Officer (Co-COO) of Sony Computer Entertainment Europe (SCEE) as of May 1, 2009.” (smarthouse.au)

We’ve been told this is the year of the PS3, this is when they bring it all together. Nintendo’s losing some of their grip on the industry with slower sales, even in Japan. The economy isn’t playing nice with any of the consoles and sales continue to drop, reportedly 17% in March compared to last years numbers.

Australia isn’t proving to be any help to Sony, “for example in Australia a consumer can now buy the Xbox 360 for $299 and a separate Blu ray player and DVD upscale player for $199. Combined this is $200 under the recommended retail price for a Sony PS3.”

Here in the United States, we’ve bought more Wii balance boards than PlayStation 3 consoles. One can argue that the Wii is a novelty system but that really casts a dark shadow on the PlayStation 3. The PS3 is being beat out by a novelty item? Can the new SCEE management change the direction of Sony?

0 thoughts on “Sony Responds To Crashing Sales with Management Shift”

  1. Sony’s in big trouble. There’ve been a few articles talking about the PlayStation 3’s death spiral, and you have to wonder if changing from Reeves to House is going to do anything.

    I mean, what can they do – aside from the obvious move of cutting the price, and doing that is financially destructive for Sony.

    As a PS – if you see the graph they include – the PS3 is about $130-140 more expensive in Australia than it is in the US if you convert the currency. It’s brutal.

  2. Sony’s in big trouble. There’ve been a few articles talking about the PlayStation 3’s death spiral, and you have to wonder if changing from Reeves to House is going to do anything.

    I mean, what can they do – aside from the obvious move of cutting the price, and doing that is financially destructive for Sony.

    As a PS – if you see the graph they include – the PS3 is about $130-140 more expensive in Australia than it is in the US if you convert the currency. It’s brutal.

  3. Maybe its high time that Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft bring their prices lower… they jacked their prices so high as if their game consoles are necessity. the world economy is going down and they can help a bit if they bring their prices lower.

  4. Maybe its high time that Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft bring their prices lower… they jacked their prices so high as if their game consoles are necessity. the world economy is going down and they can help a bit if they bring their prices lower.

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The news cycle has begun to explode, as the holiday season looms and Black Friday in sight. Jonah and TJ get into a heated argument about Destiny 2, to liven up the proceedings after the bummer of Stan Lee’s death.

This week’s news include:

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The Question of the Week is indeed “How would you fix Destiny 2?”

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In 1995 Ensemble Studios formed as an independent studio and kicked out a little game franchise known as Age of Empires. The title has received many accolades from the first in the franchise extended out to all the Age of Empires releases and spin-offs, all-in-all selling millions of copies.

Ensemble Studios had a mission “to create great games and a great place to work,” says Bruce Shelley from Ensemble Studios. Bruce Shelley also helped design Sid Meier’s Civilization and Railroad Tycoon with MicroProse prior to his work at Ensemble Studios. Now, however, he’s a bit upset at the closing of Ensemble Studios because they were profitable, created top-quality titles and had a great working environment.

Ensemble Studios, from his perspective at least, was a place you’d go to work and be happy with what you’re doing. When you’re working along nicely and become blind-sided by the news, it’s not surprising he didn’t take it lightly.

“Everyone at our studio was shocked, and I think remains very disappointed that this is going to happen. I believe we thought we were immune to shut-down talk because our published games have done so well and have been so profitable. Plus we felt we had built a really stable (low-turnover), talented, hard-working, and creative team, which is not easy to do. We thought we were among the best studios in the world, and that may be true, but we don’t fit in the future plans of MGS as an internal studio so we’re out.” (ensemblestudios.com)

What’s the future plans for Ensemble Studios? As we’ve stated before, they plan to live on in spirit, within the bounds of a new name and a new game plan. “I believe the spirit and mission of ES will be carried forward in this new company if enough of the key leaders agree to take part, which I expect to happen. There has been no announcement about what the new studio will be working on when it gets going,” says Shelley.

This is a horrible way to have to launch a hot new intellectual property. Usually creating a new title with a building fanbase would lead to excitement, parties and high hopes for the future of the franchise. Instead, people will be dusting off their resume in hopes to continue a life of game development.

Hopefully the leaders will indeed form a brand new company and build brand new hot products with their entire staff intact. Then, take their titles to a different publisher (besides Microsoft) and make some money and fans.

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An expert has given testimony to the US House of Representatives Subcomittee on Commerce, Manufacturing, and Trade during its commencement on hearings on the “unauthorized intrusion” on Sony’s PlayStation Network and Qrocity service, stating Sony knew that their security software was dated and lacked any sort of firewall against hacking.

Cybersecurity expert Dr. Gene Spafford’s testimony stated that security experts discovered discussions on forums that talked about how the PSN’s security was lacking. The threads revealed that the network was using old versions of the Apache Web server software, which “was unpatched and had no firewall installed.”

Worse, two to three months before the attack, the vulnerability was reported “in an open forum monitored by Sony employees,” but the company took no action to rectify the situation. If the testimony is accurate, Sony could be slapped with a serious criminal negligence charge.

The Sony intrusion alone compromised 100 million accounts both on the PSN and its Qriocity service, according to Spafford. He also cited the total cost of the breach to Sony, credit card companies, and other outfits, at $21 billion. Thieves in credit-card theft forums actually complained that the PSN breach was so great that it was depressing the price of such information by a “factor of five or 10” on the black market.

Spafford didn’t reserve his accusations for Sony, either. He stated that law enforcement is ill-equipped to handle cyberterrorism and cyberthieft. Additionally, most companies are not equipped with enough security measures because “investing in security measures affects the bottom line. They don’t understand the risks involved by not investing in security. … So when they are hit, they pass that cost along to their customers, and to the rest of society.” In other words, a classic case of being penny wise and pound foolish.

Spafford’s proposed solution to future security is to limit the amount of data kept by companies such as Sony and to “age the data” so it expires after a certain time.

C-Span posted the video of the testimony here.

(Thanks, GameSpot.)