Why Sony's electronics brands were closed and what the company is making money on now. Part 2

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Sony has a long history. During its existence, it has lost several directions, but continues to develop. In the first part, we told how the smartphone and player brands developed and eventually closed. Below we will tell how things developed with the laptop and TV brands, as well as what the company earns now.



VAIO laptops
In 1996, Sony decided to revive the personal computer line that it had been producing in Japan in the 1980s. The company focused on multimedia capabilities — the acronym VAIO stood for "Video Audio Integrated Operation" (built-in support for working with video and audio).

The first VAIO PCV-90 computer featured a pseudo-3D desktop that allowed the user to access built-in media features. In 1997, Sony released the VAIO PCG-707 laptop with a 12.1-inch TFT screen, a docking station with a FIEE 1394 (FireWire) port, and the ultra-thin VAIO PCG-505 laptop in a magnesium case at that time (24 mm).

And in 1998, the company released the first ultraportable notebook PCG-C1 with an 8.9-inch 480p display. It weighed 1.1 kg, had a built-in webcam, FireWire, modem and CD-R drive. It was the first netbook on the market - 9 years before Intel began developing the direction of compact laptops.


Sony VAIO C1

Later, VAIO laptops also distinguished themselves from their competitors in terms of design, ergonomics, and battery life. Sony produced thin, compact, and powerful laptops that were popular in the niche business segment.



But Sony was unable to gain a significant market share — it fluctuated between 1-3% of all PC sales.



In 2014, Japanese author Nobuyuki Hayashi, who writes about Apple, revealed that Steve Jobs considered releasing VAIO with macOS.

He met with former Sony president Kunitake Ando in Hawaii in 2001 and was willing to “make an exception for Sony” and allow macOS to be used. But the talks came to nothing.

What went wrong with the VAIO
In February 2014, Sony sold its personal computer business to Japanese investment fund JIP for 40-50 billion yen. The company retained a 5% stake in the new company. JIP itself planned to produce computers under the VAIO brand for the Japanese market.

The VAIO sale was due to ongoing operating losses at the Mobile france number data Products & Communications division, which sold computers. The division's loss from October to December 2013 was 12.6 billion yen, down from 21.3 billion yen in 2012.

Sony had several reasons for abandoning VAIO, PC World noted in 2014:

At that time, the PC market was shrinking significantly, demand for tablets was growing, and manufacturers were making little money selling computers and laptops.
To compensate for the decline, VAIO devices in recent years have been hybrids: laptop-tablet, tablet-monoblock, etc. They did not interest buyers.
"VAIOs were elegant and innovative devices, but with a fatal flaw - most of them were surprisingly expensive," writes PC World.
The publication analyzed its reviews of VAIO devices since 2008 and found a trend — Sony unjustifiably overpriced laptops even in the budget segment.

Sometimes the "shocking" price of the VAIO appeared in the headlines of reviews on the device, such as "Overpriced for such performance" or "Wait for the price drop":

2008: " The Sony VAIO VGN-Z598U is impressive, but with all the extra features it costs as much as an old car."
2009: "The super-sexy, slim VAIO X has netbook-sized specs, decent specs, and a serious $1,300 price tag. What about the more affordable Vaio W netbook? It's not cheap enough considering Sony's asking $500."
2010: " The Sony VAIO VPCY218FX is light, compact, and very stylish, but it's expensive for the performance it offers."
2011: "The VAIO Y is a good balance between a netbook and an ultraportable PC, but we expected to pay less for this set of features and performance."