Sony Mobile sales tank in Q1 2018
Only 2 million Xperia phones sold
As an Xperia fan, you likely know the drill by now — Sony sets some kind of sales target, misses it, and further lowers their yearly sales forecast and the quarter that was turned out to be exactly that. During Q1 2018, Sony Mobile managed to sell 2 million smartphones, down 1.4 million compared to Q1 2017. The last time Sony sold this few handsets was in Q1 2010 when they started their entire mobile endeavor.
To make matters worse, Sony forecasted to sell 10 million phones in 2018 but that number has since been revised down to 9 million. Even if Sony could manage hit 10 million units sold for the year, it would still be their worst year, ever.
I wrote this on April 30th 2018:
In all of 2017, Sony Mobile managed to ship 13.5 million Xperia smartphones, down from their own estimate of 14 million, which if memory serves me right, is down from their own initial 15 million estimate for FY2017.
As for 2018, don’t expect things to get better with Sony forecasting 10 million sales which very well could end up closer to 9 million unless they’re sandbagging analysts with hopes of a surprise good year.
Chances are, depending on what Apple and Samsung announce in the next month and a half, when new iPhone and Galaxy phones are likely to be unveiled, don’t be surprised if Sony finishes 2018 sales at 8.5 million (more on that below).
With sales down 1.4 million compared to the previous year, revenue was also down by ¥48.7 billion. Sony estimates their mobile division will drive ¥610 billion ($5.49 billion) in all of 2018 where Apple’s ‘Other Products’ category, which consists of Apple Watch, AirPods, and Beats headphones, did $3.7 billion in just their last quarter.
Ultimately, for Sony Mobile, there is hope — the rumored Xperia XZ4 is looking like a great contender for a modern phone, but I fear what plagues them has less to do with hardware and more to do with management and their lack of vision. For Xperia loyalists, this could prove to be a worthy phone no matter the price, but for the general market, they can’t buy what they don’t know exists.
Luckily, with PlayStation crushing it, Sony as a whole is doing just fine:
While years ago Sony saw itself as a viable top Android OEM with the ability to challenge Apple, that mentality has long dissipated and most of their decisions purely revolve around surviving. Still, the comparisons to Apple in some ways are valid and that’s not because there is a user base that decides between an Xperia or iPhone (in fact I’d wager there’s hardly anyone out there that ever decides between the two phone brands).
Instead, it’s that each new iPhone typically sets the tone for design, hardware, and software features which are then copied as quickly as possible by the herds of Android OEMs out there. Look no further than the countless phones arriving in 2018 which have a notch on top to mimic the iPhone X design without actually offering the functionality that forces the iPhone to have the notch.
So whether its a notch on the top, an OLED display, or edge-to-edge design¹, the Android market does its best to adapt to the new market expectations, which is where Sony Mobile comes in. When Apple sets a new design language and the majority of the market moves in that direction, Xperia, which is hardly known for being nimble lags behind these market realities, often by years, and that’s a problem when you’re selling $699-$999 phones.
When as a consumer you know there’s a $999 iPhone with a dual camera, edge-to-edge OLED, and other features like Face ID and the Xperia you’re looking at offers none of those, it’s suddenly that much harder to justify that spend. Now that Galaxy S9 or knockoff Android phone with a notch becomes a far more compelling purchase which is who Sony is losing their sales — not to Apple and iPhone, but to other Android vendors.
¹ Keep in mind, none of these are necessarily a first by Apple but they are first to do them in volume, resulting in a much more meaningful impact.
Thanks for reading! If you liked this post, let me and others know by 👏 below (you can 👏 more than once!) which also helps the site grow!
