Can the PS3 Save Sony?
by Henning FischerA few things popped out of Wired’s September article: Can the PS3 Save Sony?
“With digital entertainment, you have to think about hardware, software, and services that tie them all together,” says [Phil] Wiser, who managed to heave Sony onto the MP3 bandwagon before leaving earlier this year for a Silicon Valley startup. “But it’s very hard to quantify the advantage of good software. If you’re in a hardware company and you analyze it from a financial perspective, you just want to do it as cheaply as you can. Software and services are an afterthought.”
Great. You are selling a game console and the software and services are an afterthought.
Perhaps even more telling:
“At the root of Sony’s precarious position — not just in the industry, but with gamers at large — is the company’s overweening ambition. The PS3 is all about power. Sony has said curiously little about whether this amped-up Linux über-computer will actually be fun to play. Meanwhile, Nintendo wowed everyone at this year’s E3 with the Wii, a console you can play simply by waving a wand at the screen. And Microsoft has upped the quotient by making it easy to play with all your buddies online.”
These are some of the same reasons Disney had to buy Pixar, Ford and GM are in talks with Nissan/Renault and why Will Wright says “It turns out that we don’t use computers to enhance our math skills — we use them to expand our people skills.”
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on Tuesday, August 29th, 2006 at 1:37 pm and is filed under Management, Product Design, Product Management.
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