Sony- Netbooks are Here to Stay; Touch Enabled VAIOs This Year
Sony has long held the Apple viewpoint about netbooks- they are not products that interest them due to the low margin. Sony keeps their eye on producing more premium products, even their recent VAIO W “netbook” is at least $100 more than competitor’s netbooks. The realities of the consumer netbook market must be settling into the executives at Sony — an interview of a Sony executive by LAPTOP Magazine indicates the electronics giant is changing their point of view.
The main takeaways from the interview with Sony’s Mike Abary:
- VAIOs with touch screens will be released this fall with Windows 7.
- Sony must be more competitive with their products as consumers are very price conscious.
- Sony has reorganized and the Sony Reader group is now in the same internal group as the VAIO, Playstation and Walkman product lines. Sony will focus on bringing a Reader experience to the VAIO line.
- The Playstation Network will be used to bring TV and movie content to the VAIO line.
This is just a summary of the interview that covered a lot of ground. Check out the entire interview to get the full picture from Sony. It definitely sounds like they are waking up to market realities.
Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial.
As a Sony Reader fan this can only be good news… However I hope this reorg will not affect October’s new reader I am saving up for.
It will be interesting to see how access to this expanded team will change the Reader experience… Hopefully they keep in mind it is first and foremost a Reader, and focus on improving the areas that need work such as the purchasing interface.
I would hate to see a bunch of half assed attempts to force in features that detract from the crisp reading experience (like a web browser or even that bloody touch screen).