Sony Corp on Wednesday unveiled new mobile devices which can function as displays for PlayStation games, as it adds features to win sales in a market dominated by Apple Inc and Samsung Electronics Co.
The marquee Xperia Z3 smartphone is waterproof and comes with a battery that can stay charged for two days, Sony said on its Web site. The Tokyo-based company also announced the Z3 Compact smartphone with a 4.6-inch screen and an 8-inch tablet computer.
Chief executive officer Kazuo Hirai has been pushing his “One Sony” plan aimed at better integrating the company’s electronics and entertainment assets to revive earnings.
Photo: Bloomberg
The PlayStation 4 has been one of the few bright spots for Sony, outselling Microsoft Corp’s Xbox One, amid a decade of television losses and lackluster demand for Xperia smartphones, which barely crack the top 10 globally in shipments.
Sony is forecasting its sixth annual loss in seven years and Hirai cut the company’s full-year smartphone sales projection to 43 million units from an earlier forecast of 50 million.
Meanwhile, Taiwan’s Acer Inc (宏碁) and Asustek Computer Inc (華碩), as well as South Korea’s Samsung Electronics Co and other electronics companies, on Wednesday unveiled their latest product lineups ahead of the Sept. 5 through Sept. 10 IFA electronics trade show in Berlin, Germany, with an eye on the year-end holiday shopping season in the US.
Acer showcased three Iconia series tablets running on Windows and Android operating systems, and a new Liquid series smartphone, claiming it is the smallest and lightest 5-inch device on the market. It announced plans to release a 50 euro (US$66) smartphone next year.
However, the Taiwanese company insisted that the keyboard computer market was not dead and introduced two Aspire R series convertible notebooks and two Aspire Switch series two-in-one PCs.
The company is optimistic about its turnaround progress and expects its third-quarter revenues to maintain growth momentum, based on its back-to-school promotions and the worldwide release of new products scheduled for the second half of the year.
As for fellow Taiwanese manufacturer Asustek, the company took the wraps off the ZenWatch, its first smartwatch using the Android Wear operating platform. The wearable can be paired with newer Android phones to display information and monitor the wearer’s activity. The watch can be used to find a smartphone, something Samsung has done with some of its watches, as long as the phone is also made by Samsung.
ZenWatch comes at a higher-than-expected starting price of US$262, more expensive than LG Electronic Co’s G Watch priced at US$179 and Sony’s SmartWatch 2 at US$199, but cheaper than the Samsung Gear 2 which starts at US$299.
Other new products Asustek showcased included the 13.3-inch Zenbook UX305 laptop, the 11.6-inch EeeBook X205 laptop running the Windows 8.1 operating system, and the 7-inch MeMO Pad 7 Android tablet powered by an Intel Atom 64-bit quad-core processor.
Semiconductor business between Taiwan and the US is a “win-win” model for both sides given the high level of complementarity, the government said yesterday responding to tariff threats from US President Donald Trump. Home to the world’s largest contract chipmaker, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), Taiwan is a key link in the global technology supply chain for companies such as Apple Inc and Nvidia Corp. Trump said on Monday he plans to impose tariffs on imported chips, pharmaceuticals and steel in an effort to get the producers to make them in the US. “Taiwan and the US semiconductor and other technology industries
The US Federal Reserve is expected to announce a pause in rate cuts on Wednesday, as policymakers look to continue tackling inflation under close and vocal scrutiny from US President Donald Trump. The Fed cut its key lending rate by a full percentage point in the final four months of last year and indicated it would move more cautiously going forward amid an uptick in inflation away from its long-term target of 2 percent. “I think they will do nothing, and I think they should do nothing,” Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis former president Jim Bullard said. “I think the
SMALL AND EFFICIENT: The Chinese AI app’s initial success has spurred worries in the US that its tech giants’ massive AI spending needs re-evaluation, a market strategist said Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) start-up DeepSeek’s (深度求索) eponymous AI assistant rocketed to the top of Apple Inc’s iPhone download charts, stirring doubts in Silicon Valley about the strength of the US’ technological dominance. The app’s underlying AI model is widely seen as competitive with OpenAI and Meta Platforms Inc’s latest. Its claim that it cost much less to train and develop triggered share moves across Asia’s supply chain. Chinese tech firms linked to DeepSeek, such as Iflytek Co (科大訊飛), surged yesterday, while chipmaking tool makers like Advantest Corp slumped on the potential threat to demand for Nvidia Corp’s AI accelerators. US stock
Cryptocurrencies gave a lukewarm reception to US President Donald Trump’s first policy moves on digital assets, notching small gains after he commissioned a report on regulation and a crypto reserve. Bitcoin has been broadly steady since Trump took office on Monday and was trading at about US$105,000 yesterday as some of the euphoria around a hoped-for revolution in cryptocurrency regulation ebbed. Smaller cryptocurrency ether has likewise had a fairly steady week, although was up 5 percent in the Asia day to US$3,420. Bitcoin had been one of the most spectacular “Trump trades” in financial markets, gaining 50 percent to break above US$100,000 and
RSS