Harry Styles saves the day for Sony’s music arm
Sony was buoyed by its music division this quarter, with the group’s profitability countervailing the Japanese giant’s reduced gaming success.
Music revenues climbed from JPY 217 billion (£1.2bn) to JPY 359 billion (£2.1bn), with higher sales across recorded music and publishing thanks to new music from big hitters like Harry Styles.
Although gaming revenue also increased to JPY 645 billion (£3.7bn) to JPY 721 billion (£4.3bn) Sony said that the revenue suffered from weak sales of third party games software and higher software development costs.
Sony also posted extra costs with its $3.6bn acquisition of Bungie, which completed this summer.
The firm said it expects similar trends to continue as we head into the next quarter.
The upside was that the weakening Japanese Yen against the US dollar boosts the value of Sony’s overseas earnings.