Sony aims to be world's third biggest smartphone vendor

Sony aims to be the world’s third biggest smartphone vendor after Apple and Samsung in its fiscal year starting from April 1, said the head of the group’s mobile business, Kunimasa Suzuki, at a roundtable briefing in Tokyo. Media reported that he indicated Sony would alter smartphone development for each market, suggesting that it may produce less expensive models for developing countries.

Suzuki stated that Sony intended to sell over 34 million units in its next fiscal year, compared to a previously announced target of 34 million units in the current year. Sony was ranked fourth in the fourth quarter of 2012, according to IDC, with a 4.5 per cent market share. This placed it behind Huawei’s 4.9 per cent and ahead of ZTE’s 4.3 per cent.

Elsewhere, Bloomberg writes that Sony aims to make its mobile phone unit profitable next year. The vendor said it sold 160,000 units of its Xperia Z smartphone in the two weeks since its introduction in Japan on February 9, citing a survey by NTT DoCoMo. The news report also cites Ace Securities analyst Hideki Yasuda stating that Samsung would need to sell about 50 million smartphones to place third in its next fiscal year.