Sony Raises Fiscal Outlook with Strong PS5 Sales

In sharp contrast to the rest of the tech industry, Sony has some good news, and it raised its financial and PlayStation 5 sales targets for 2023. That’s right: Sony is seeing an uptick this quarter and for the current fiscal year, which ends March 31.

“I’m obsessed with growth,” incoming Sony Group president Kenichiro Yoshida said Thursday morning. “Any businesses and companies tend to go into a negative spiral if growth stalls. By realizing growth, I would like to create a positive spiral where we are chosen by customers and our employees are energized.”

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For the quarter ending December 31, FQ3 2022, Sony reported a net income of $2.7 billion on revenues of $23.7 billion, with that latter figure growing by 13 percent year-over-year (YOY). And Sony’s Game & Network Services group, which is responsible for the PlayStation videogame platform, saw the biggest growth of its businesses, with revenues of $9.7 billion, up 53 percent YOY.

Sony credited a significant increase in console sales, first-party software sales, and the impact of foreign exchange rates—a strong U.S. dollar—for the gains. The firm also noted that PlayStation 5 production increased in the quarter, as did inventory. Sony sold 7.1 million PlayStation 5 consoles in the quarter and has now sold over 32 million units. PS5 active users rose 30 percent in the quarter as well, and 30 percent of PS5 users overall had never used its predecessor, the PlayStation 4. “The acquisition of new users is progressing,” the firm noted.

In some ways, the most interesting aspect of the Sony report is its guidance for the remainder of its fiscal year: Sony now expects to sell 19 million PS5s in the fiscal year, and it says that revenues from the Game & Network Services group should be about 17 percent higher than previous expectations.

Sony is also looking forward to the release of its expensive PS VR2 virtual reality peripheral for the PS5, which will start shipping to customers on February 22. “By maximizing next-generation sensing functionality and the performance of the PS5, we aim to provide a virtual reality experience like never before,” Sony said. “In anticipation of the launch, we are preparing a lineup of more than 30 titles, including Horizon Call of the Mountain, the latest title in our IP, and Gran Turismo 7, which will be upgradeable to PS VR2 for free.”

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