The Civil War Inside Sony

from the it's-one-company... dept

The example I usually use of a big company with different divisions not understanding synergy at all is AOL Time Warner. However, the other big one that people talk about is Sony. Wired Magazine takes a look at the civil war within Sony that has even created situations where the company is suing itself. The fight pits the computer electronics and computing side of the company against their music label. The article basically says the two sides refuse to cooperate. Maybe I'm missing something but these guys work for the same company. There must be someone in charge whose job it is to make sure these two companies work together properly. If the people there refuse to work together, then it's time to bring in new people who will work together. When you have two parts of your company fighting against each other, it's time for someone to take a step back, and look for the optimal solution. Clearly, the current strategy isn't working. Update: In a related story, Sony has now teamed up with 3 other consumer electronics manufacturers to build a service that will let people download music directly to their consumer electronics devices. But, they're doing so with Sony's ridiculous copy protection enabled, meaning no one will want it.
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  1. identicon
    Joe Schmoe, 24 Jan 2003 @ 9:03am

    er,

    Do you really want them to work together better? Might just lead to more and stronger, consumer unfriendly, DRM...

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. icon
    Mike (profile), 24 Jan 2003 @ 9:08am

    Re: er,

    Sure. Let them try. If they do that, it will destroy their business. That's what their strategy has been so far. Beef up the DRM, and they see that it isn't working. No one wants to buy a portable music player from Sony.

    My point is that if they're *really* working together in a way that looks at the *real* benefits and *real* synergies, they'll realize that offering a consumer friendly solution is the way to go.

    If they don't, they'll fail. Others will offer it for them.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  3. identicon
    Joe Schmoe, 24 Jan 2003 @ 9:50am

    Re: er,

    True. It's not like we're clammering to buy the crippled tech.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  4. identicon
    thecaptain, 24 Jan 2003 @ 9:54am

    Re: er,

    "If they don't, they'll fail. Others will offer it for them."
    I don't like to make that assumption...
    [sarcasm]after all, we all know how easy it is to start a small electronics company right?[/sarcasm]
    What I'm afraid of is for Sony to get in gear, decide beefed up mandatory DRM is a good thing, then using market share and money and contacts it convinces the other biggies (of which there aren't that many of) of the same thing...boom...the customer is faced with no choice.
    I realize this may be unlikely, but I don't believe its as far fetched as some ppl would make it seem (ie: someone'll make stuff without DRM).
    I get the same feeling about Palladium and its hardware counterpart...if both AMD and Intel join the club (and I think they have...) how can I buy a chip without this stuff?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  5. identicon
    dorpus, 24 Jan 2003 @ 11:12am

    Post-Morita Sony

    Sony was built up under the vision of Akio Morita, who had the benefit of both an American education and working for the Japanese Imperial Army's think tank during WW2. He got to design infrared goggles and other gadgets for Japanese troops, which were never deployed. Sony did well under his leadership. Ever since, the company hasn't come out with anything new or interesting.

    link to this | view in thread ]


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