Tuesday, Feb 5, 2008
How an electronics leader such as Sony can have fallen from grace over the years is beyond me. Lemme rephrase it, it is simply a failure on their part to forsee the future and capitalize on emerging trends. CD player murdered by the MP3 player. More specifically, murdered by the Ipod. The CD player is not dead just yet but as more and more automakers and automobile aftermarket parts maker begin to shift away from in dash multidisk changers in favor of MP3 player docks, again more specifically Ipod docks and other MP3 player variants, you will see the eventual demise of the CD player as a primary or even secondary media player. Instead it will fall to the wayside as a media delivery tool until something much better than the optical drive emerges. And no, solid state memory will not be that mdia delivery tool for those wondering. If I were the electronics giant Sony, with all my divisions and businesses and seemingly bottomless money purse, I would begin making convergence devices that combine its combined strengths. More to the point I would combine the Walkman/Diskman brand, Playstation brand,Bravia brand and Erricson brand. It would seem as if it would be a nobrainer to combine the awesomeness of the Bravia television brand with a built in Playstation 3. The Bravia branded televisions are some of the best performing and looking flat panel televisions out there and combining them with the solution of a build in, full featured (think first generation hardware PS3 with full backward compatibility) PS3 (BD drive included) and my friends you have a legitimate reason for people to seriously go buy a large expensive television, expensive Blue Ray movies and expensive Blue Ray PS3 titles. Am I the only person to see the logic in a move like this? Flat panel television prices steadlily come down and yet, even thought the tv's are still expensive, people are still going out and buying them. When they get to the point where they are no more expensive than standard definition CRT's, what harm could adding more value to them by releasing a much more featured set that costs what current flat tv's cost. I own nothing Sony and never have but I would buy a Bravia PS3 version TV as it would save me the need to buy more devices to clutter up my entertainemnt area. Now lets talk portable devices. The easiest way to spur sales of these devices is to combine features/ The Erricson line of phones is solid and pretty good when it comes to quality. But when compared to its competitors it pales in comparison in terms of features, design and functionality. Instead of just making redesigned and more powerful phones which cannot hope to stand up to the behemoths such as LG, Nokia, Motorola, etc., why not seriously merge two of their best know brans into one and advertise the hell out of them; I am of course talking about merging the Erricson and Diskman. The Erricson Diskman or whatever sony calls their MP3 players would be an instant threat to any music phone. If you take it one step further and include the very small success that is the PSP and incorporate it into the design you have a superthreat to all portable devices. People have shown that they are not to concerned with the size of their media devices so long as you pack tons of features into the smallest form factor you can. The N-Gage failed primarily because it tried to do something it was il-equiped to do, namely portable gaming. Their is no future/profit to be had in cell phone games when there are much better alternatives such as the DS for gaming and a cell phone such as the Iphone for music and phone. Imagine if the Iphone had screens on both sides and opened up like a DS and played DS games? You could take the previous size of a DS, which was not at all to large, smooth it out, add phone capabilities and media playback (lets not forget capacity for storing the music/movies) and you have a device that is what everybody wants. I see the demise of their position as a world leader in electronics without clear vision.
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