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Sony Corp. Chief Financial Officer Hiroki Totoki meets the press in Tokyo on Feb. 1, 2019, to discuss Sony's earnings estimate for the 2018 fiscal year.
- Discussing Sony's FY2018 Q3 earnings, chief financial officer Hiroki Totoki said the movement toward cloud gaming and video game streaming services could be a potential threat to the company's PlayStation gaming brand.
- Sony's PlayStation 4 is still the most popular video game console of this generation, with more than 90 consoles sold worldwide.
- The large install base has allowed PlayStation to steadily increase earnings from digital games, movies, and subscriptions, even as console sales have started to decline.
While its competitors at Microsoft, Amazon, and Google are diving head first into new streaming technology for video games, Sony sees the rise of cloud gaming services as a potential risk.
During its FY2018 Q3 earnings call, Sony CFO Hiroki Totoki said "games going to the cloud" could be a future threat to Sony's business, and the company will continue to lean on the success of the PlayStation 4 while exploring ways to embrace the cloud gaming trend.
Sony's PlayStation 4 is the leading video game console on the market, having shipped more than 90 million units worldwide since its launch in 2013. But sales of the console have steadily declined in the past year, suggesting that the industry is ready for a new generation of console hardware to arrive. However, new technology associated with cloud gaming could remove the need for video game hardware entirely.