Sony's Game Plan Goes Mobile
March 24 2016 - 7:30AM
Dow Jones News
TOKYO—Sony Corp. said Thursday it would start making games for
smartphones including Apple Inc.'s iPhones and Android phones,
following rival Nintendo Co.'s move into the fast-growing
market.
The move allows Sony to fill a gap in its game business and
expand its PlayStation line beyond game-dedicated consoles. Asian
users increasingly prefer to play games in spare moments on the
smartphones they already carry in their pockets rather than
spending a block of time in front of a TV screen with a specialized
gaming console.
That is particularly true in Japan, where many people commute by
train. Revenue from smartphone games reached ¥ 473 billion ($4.21
billion) in 2014, more than the ¥ 373 billion in revenue from the
console videogame market, according to the Computer Entertainment
Supplier's Association.
Sony said its mobile games would be available first in Japan and
other Asian nations, with the possibility of expanding elsewhere
later. It said Sony Computer Entertainment Inc., the unit in charge
of the PlayStation business, would set up a subsidiary called
ForwardWorks to develop and distribute the mobile games.
A Sony Computer Entertainment spokeswoman declined to say when
the first mobile game would be released or whether the company
intended to charge for downloads of its smartphone games.
ForwardWorks will be based in Tokyo and headed by Atsushi Morita,
the chief of PlayStation in Japan and Asia. Mr. Morita is the
nephew of the late Sony co-founder Akio Morita.
Sony's flagship PlayStation 4 console has sold more than 36
million units world-wide since its launch in November 2013,
outpacing rival Wii U from Nintendo and the Xbox One from Microsoft
Corp. Analysts say North America and Europe account for the
majority of sales, with Japan lagging.
"We decided to focus on Japan and Asia for this new initiative
because the mobile games are especially large in these regions when
compared with other markets," the Sony spokeswoman said.
Nintendo also struggled for years with the issue of whether to
introduce mobile games, which it feared could undercut its core
business of selling game consoles and software for those consoles.
It finally decided to make the move in 2015, and last week
introduced its first smartphone game, called Miitomo, in Japan.
Miitomo recorded more than a million downloads in its first
three days, according to Nintendo, which plans to release the game
in the U.S. and Europe later this month. Four more smartphone games
are set to be released by March 2017, although Nintendo hasn't said
whether those titles will include popular characters such as Mario
the plumber.
The Sony plan announced Thursday isn't the company's first
venture into mobile gaming. In 2011, Sony introduced PlayStation
Suite, later renamed PlayStation Mobile, which gave videogame
creators a way to build games for the hand-held PlayStation Vita as
well as selected smartphones running Google's Android operating
system. The service was terminated last year after it failed to
attract many users.
Amir Anvarzadeh, head of Japan equities at BGC Partners, said
the latest move would be favored by investors, although he said
mobile games weren't likely to contribute much to Sony's earnings.
"Sony will be doing very well with or without mobile gaming
content," he said.
Write to Takashi Mochizuki at takashi.mochizuki@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
March 24, 2016 07:15 ET (11:15 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2016 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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