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Sony's Stringer steps down as president, CEO
by Staff Writers
Tokyo (AFP) Feb 1, 2012


Howard Stringer, the Welsh-born American head of Japanese games, music and electronics giant Sony, is to step down as its president and CEO, the company said Wednesday.

He will be succeeded by Kazuo Hirai, a games and music veteran, who will take over as president and chief executive in April, a company statement said, while Stringer will become chairman of the board of directors in June.

"I look forward to helping Kaz in every way I can so that succession leads inevitably to success," said Stringer. "He is ready to lead, and the time to make this change is now."

Hirai, 51, played a major role in developing the PlayStation in the 1990s and has spent most of his career at Sony in videogames, movies, music and other software businesses.

"As challenging as times are for Sony now, were it not for the strong leadership of Sir Howard Stringer these past seven years, we would have been in a much more difficult position," he said.

Reports have previously said the Tokyo-based maker of PlayStation consoles and Bravia televisions is planning a drastic restructuring under Hirai to try to return to profit after four consecutive years in the red.

Hirai's earlier promotion to deputy president was seen by analysts as signalling a greater focus on pushing content to multiple hardware platforms such as game consoles, smartphones and tablet computers.

Sony is projecting an annual net loss this year of 90 billion yen ($1.2 billion), as it reels from the impact of a strong yen, weak sales, and severe flooding in Thailand.

Two weeks ago, ratings agency Moody's downgraded Sony's debt to Baa1 from A3, saying the company faced "weak and volatile" earnings and a long struggle to get back on a firm financial footing.

The company's television division has been particularly troublesome, losing money in the face of severe competition and minuscule margins.

In December, Sony extricated itself from a joint liquid crystal display-making venture with Korean electronics giant Samsung after seven years.

Sony had a particularly troubled 2011. A massive data breach forced it to shut down its PlayStation Network and Qriocity services in April with more than 100 million customer accounts compromised, in a crisis that quickly followed Japan's earthquake, tsunami and nuclear crisis.

Stringer, 69, is the latest in a series of high-profile foreigners to leave top positions in Japanese firms.

Briton Michael Woodford was sacked as CEO of camera and medical equipment maker Olympus, later revealing the firm's cover-up of $1.7 billion in losses, while Jasjit Bhattal, the Indian-origin head of Nomura's wholesale division, resigned from Japan's top brokerage in January.

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Japan's Sharp forecasts $3.8 billion loss
Tokyo (AFP) Feb 1, 2012 - Japanese electronics maker Sharp said Wednesday it expected a full-year net loss of $3.8 billion, blaming falling prices, a high yen and the global economic slowdown.

The firm expects to lose 290 billion yen for the year to March, reversing an earlier projection of a six billion yen net profit.

For the nine months to December it made a net loss of 213.5 billion yen, compared with a 21.83 billion yen profit in the corresponding period in the previous year, it said.

During the same period, operating losses came to 9.1 billion yen, reversing operating profit of 66.5 billion yen in the previous year, while sales fell 18.3 percent to 1.9 trillion yen, Sharp said.

"Major price falls of products and devices such as LCD colour televisions and solar batteries as well as a dramatic increase of the yen" resulted in the lower revenues, the company said in a statement.

Sharp's predicament is shared by its rivals, most of which have failed to make profits by making televisions due to intensifying competition forcing manufacturers to cut prices to gain an edge.

Sharp booked an extraordinary item of 80.9 billion yen for structural reforms and losses related to the suspension of a large LCD plant in Japan after the devastating earthquake and tsunami in March.

It also booked corporate tax and other expenses of 115.2 billion yen after revaluing deferred tax assets on its books.

For the year to March, the company expects only to break even at the operating level, compared with an earlier forecast of an 85 billion yen profit.

It lowered its sales estimate by 8.9 percent to 2.55 trillion yen from 2.80 trillion yen.

Sony, Toshiba and Panasonic, among other major makers, have also bled red ink by making televisions, as unit prices have steadily fallen amid tough competition from foreign rivals such as Samsung.

Hitachi has decided to stop making televisions on its own later this year and outsource to foreign manufacturers.

Japanese firms were also hit hard by sluggish TV demand at home, after record sales last fiscal year due to a temporary subsidy as the country shifted to digital terrestrial broadcasting from an analogue system.



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Bolivians demand controversial highway be built
La Paz (AFP) Jan 30, 2012
More than 2,000 Amazon Indians on Monday called on Bolivian President Evo Morales to approve the building of a highway through a nature reserve, a project scrapped last year after widespread protests. Demonstrators rallied in the capital La Paz, some of them after a protest march of 400 kilometers (240 miles) which was backed by Morales. They planned to stage a sit-in in the city center, org ... read more


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