Sony
spinoff Vaio Corp., is looking to move further beyond its roots as a
personal-computer maker as it prepares to report its first annual
operating profit in years, its chief executive officer said. Vaio
will seek joint-venture partners for potential new businesses
building products such as robots, internet-ready gadgets and
virtual-reality technology—in fact, “any computing devices,”
CEO Yoshimi Ota said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal.
“Vaio
will evolve into a total technology company focusing on
manufacturing,” he said. Such a transformation is
essential for even the most dominant PC makers if they hope to
generate sustainable growth, and success could make Vaio a model for
the industry, Gartner Inc. analyst Kanae Maita said.
The PC market is so saturated that even top-tier companies with
enormous economies of scale are no longer assured survival, analysts
say. The market contracted 11% during the first quarter of this year,
according to research and advisory firm Gartner. Big PC makers such
as Dell Inc. and Lenovo Group Ltd., for example, have diversified
into businesses ranging from consulting services to wearable gadgets.
Vaio suffered
years of losses before Sony Corp. sold it in 2014 to private-equity
fund Japan Industrial Partners Inc., which appointed Mr. Ota as chief
executive a year ago. Vaio’s annual losses date to at least 2012,
according to Sony, though former Vaio officials say the business
peaked in 2006. A Sony spokeswoman declined to disclose the PC unit’s
stand-alone figures before 2012.
Mr.
Ota said all of the company’s PC lines were profitable in the
financial year ended May 31, while contract electronics manufacturing
and a Windows smartphone also contributed to its bottom line. He
declined to provide specific figures because the numbers weren’t
final, but said he expected operating and net profit to rise in this
fiscal year. Vaio plans to release its results for the last fiscal
year after August.
Now Vaio is ready to take the next step, and it won’t be a
marriage with a domestic peer PC manufacturer, Mr. Ota said. Earlier
this year, Toshiba Corp. gave up on a plan to merge its unprofitable
PC division with Vaio and the PC unit of Fujitsu Ltd. Toshiba
officials say they still want to combine its PC unit with Vaio, but
Mr. Ota said he sees “no need” for his company to do so.
Vaio
plans an initial public offering by May 2018, or to find another
investor to replace Japan Industrial Partners. An ideal sponsor would
be an investor from outside the PC industry, Mr. Ota said. Mr.
Ota said he expects Vaio’s PC business to remain profitable
regardless of market conditions. Revenue generated by contract
manufacturing would also support the company’s bottom line. Apart
from producing PCs, Vaio assembles robots and wearable gadgets as
well as automotive-related components for other companies.
Meanwhile,
several series of Sony Vaio laptops are being recalled
in Qatar because their batteries have been known to overheat, the
Ministry of Economy and Commerce (MEC) has said. The Ministry
announced the recall of Sony Vaio Laptop Batteries VGP-BPS26 due to
overheat in battery models SVE1413 Series - SVE1513 Series which was
sold with a battery problem during buying, and for the following
models, which may be provided with a battery with same problem during
maintenance: VPCCB14/3/2/ Series, SVE14113/2/ Series, SVE14A13/2/
Series, SVE15123/ Series, VPCEH12/ Series, SVE17123/ series, VPCEJ12/
Series.
The ministry said the recall comes within the framework of ongoing
coordination and follow-up by the ministry to ascertain the extent of
car dealerships' commitment to follow up defects and repair them to
protect consumers' rights. The ministry also stressed that it will
coordinate with the dealership to follow up maintenance and repair
operations and will communicate with customers to ensure
implementation of the procedures to fix defects. It urged consumers
to report any abuses or irregularities by communicating with the
Department of Consumer Protection and Commercial Fraud Combat.
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