Sony Ericsson arrived at this year’s 3GSM Congress closely following a series
of announcements that enforce the company’s clear ambition to make it the aspirational
and accessible choice for millions more mobile phone users worldwide.
3GSM World Congress, Barcelona, Spain – Sony Ericsson president Miles Flint comments:
“In our first five years we have successfully established ourselves as an aspirational
brand in the mobile phone market. We continue to build on this with products such
as the W880, a super-slim, high performance 3G Walkman®, that will begin to ship
this month. We know what consumers want. With recent announcements of more mid-
and low-end handsets such as the K550 Cyber-shot™ and the W200 Walkman® phone,
we are now making the Sony Ericsson brand accessible to a wider range of consumers.
We aim to make the Sony Ericsson experience aspirational at all price points in
the portfolio, from high-end phones to our new talk and text phones, the J110,
J120, K200 and K220 models.”
2006 was a record year for sales, net income and profit for Sony Ericsson. The
company sold 60 million music enabled phones, 17 million of which were Walkman®
handsets. In the same period, 4.5 million Cyber-shot™ phones were sold. Since
the beginning of the year Sony Ericsson has made a series of announcements that
build on the momentum of 2006, with nine new handsets for the GSM market, and
in Japan NTT DoCoMo, Inc. announced two new phones by Sony Ericsson, including
the first BRAVIA brand handset which delivers mobile TV functionality. Sony Ericsson
has also announced its first HSDPA product, the Tri-Band HSDPA/UMTS and Quad-Band
EDGE/GPRS PC300 Mobile Broadband PC Card for laptops, and a host of new accessories
that enable consumers to enhance their experience of entertainment and communications
on the move.
Making phones available at lower price points requires improvements in cost efficiencies
at high production volumes while protecting quality. To this end, at the end of
January Sony Ericsson announced it plans to manufacture mobile phones in Chennai,
India in partnership with Flextronics and Foxconn, its global outsourcing manufacturing
partners. This will enable Sony Ericsson to offer appealing products at even more
competitive price points, especially at the lowest end of the portfolio.
Shortly before 3GSM World Congress Sony Ericsson completed its acquisition of
the Swedish software company UIQ Technology AB from Symbian Ltd following full
regulatory ratification. The company plans to give more details on its strategy
for the development of UIQ Technology during 3GSM.
Miles Flint concludes: “We have started 2007 in a very strong position, announcing
more new products at a wider range of price points than ever before this early
in the year. Looking ahead, we fully expect millions more people to enjoy the
benefits of the Sony Ericsson brand, making us well placed to gain further market
share this year.”
Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications serves the global communications market with
innovative and feature-rich mobile phones, accessories and PC-cards. Established
as a joint venture by Sony and Ericsson in 2001, with global corporate functions
located in London, the company employs over 7,500 people worldwide, including
R&D sites in Europe, Japan, China and America. Sony Ericsson celebrated the
5th anniversary of the start of the joint venture on 1st October, 2006.
Sony Ericsson is the global title sponsor of the Women's Tennis Association,
and works with the Association to promote the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour in over 80
cities during the year. The tour culminates at the Sony Ericsson Championships
in Madrid, Spain, in November.
For more information on Sony Ericsson, please visit www.sonyericsson.com |