Sony reports 24% rise in profits due to strong demand for music and movies

Sony has said its quarterly profit rose by 24% due to healthy demand for its music and movies, prompting the Japanese entertainment and electronics giant to raise its annual sales and profit forecasts.

Tokyo-based Sony’s July-September profit totalled 264 billion yen (£1.55bn), up from 213 billion yen (£1.25bn) in the previous year.

Entertainment companies have tended to thrive during the pandemic, as people stuck at home turned to games and movies. Sony makes PlayStation video game consoles and also offers online gaming.

Sony shipped 3.3 million PlayStation 5 game consoles during the second quarter of the April-March financial year.

Although Sony’s games business quarterly sales rose, its profit declined due to higher costs. Sony acquired US video game developer Bungie during the quarter.

In music, top-selling recordings included Beyonce’s Renaissance and Harry Styles’s Harry’s House. Among its films, Bullet Train, starring Brad Pitt, earned 233 million dollars (£202m) globally.

Sony raised its sales forecast for the financial year through March 2023 to 11.6 trillion yen. Sony’s sales totalled 9.9 trillion yen in the previous financial year.

Sony is among Japan’s stellar brands, having brought the world the Walkman portable music player. But it had humble beginnings in the 1940s, when the nation was rebuilding from the ashes of the Second World War.

In more recent decades, Sony’s electronics division has faced tough competition from cheaper Asian rivals. Sales of TVs that were once pillars of Sony’s power, for instance, have declined.