Introduction

One of the most famous names found in consumer electronics is a company called Sony
Corporation, who is currently ranked second worldwide and only behind Matsushita Electric
Corporation. Some or the products created by Sony are transistor radio, the Trinitron
television, the Betamax VCR, Compact Disc player, the Walkman cassette player and the
PlayStation game console. Two thirds of the overall revenues of the company come from its
electronics segment which consists of monitors, telecommunications devices, computers,
computer peripherals and electronic components. Game consoles and software gives the
company about nine per cent of revenues. Whereas Sonys music business which consists of
Columbia and Epic record labels accounts for ten per cent of revenues. Sonys motion picture
and television business accounts for another seven per cent of revenue and the last six per
cent originates from Sonys insurance business segment ("SonyCorporation", 2017) .

During world war two, Akio Morita, a young physicist, and Masaru Ibuka, an engineer had
their first meeting at sessions of research committee meetings and became close friends
despite the huge age gap between them. They then went their separate ways and lost contact
towards the end of the Second World War. After the war, on September 1945, Masaru Ibuka
returns to Tokyo. He then starts a new business with a handful of engineers, based in a room
on the third floor of Shirokiya department store. Then name of the company was then called
Tokyo Tsushin Kenkyujo( Tokyo Telecommunications Research Institute) or shortened as
Totsuken. Due to the high demand for news after the war, many people are asking for radios.
Most people have radios that are damaged due to war, or radio edited by the military police to
prevent them from being influenced by enemies propaganda. These radios are the repaired by
Totsuken and are made able to convert medium frequency units to all-wave receivers using
shortwave adapters made by Totsuken. The shortwave adapters received wide attention and
eventually if was featured on the Japans leading broadsheet newspaper, Asahi Shimbun. The
feature was then read by Akio Morita who then wrote to the elder engineer( Ibuka), who
replied immediately, calling Morito to join him as a business partner at Totsuken by coming
to Tokyo. Due to Moritas job offer as a lecturer at the Tokyo Institute of Technology, he
moved to Tokyo at once to reunite with Ibuka ("Sony", 2014).

Ibuka and Morita were reunited on 7 May 1946. They then partnered up to form a new
electrical equipment company called the Tokyo Tsushin Kogyo K.K ( Tokyo
Telecommunications Engineering Corporation), simplified as Totsuko. Both of them then
invested 190,000 into Totsuko, with an initial manpower of only 20 people, with zero

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machinery and minimal amount of scientific equipment, adapting radios and making vacuum-
tube voltmeters were Totsukos main business. Even from the start, Ibuka and Morita were
thinking on a global scale, and knew Totsuko needed to market its product to the whole
world. Their main motive were to create, develop, and design products that would create a
whole new market not limited to only Japan, but towards the whole world. They needed a
global identity to expand the business into important markets in the US and across Europe.
Westerners found Totsuko to be hard to pronounce so they began thinking for a new name.
At first, Morita and Ibuka thought of using TTK( initial of their company), but it turns out
that a Japanese railway company had already used the name. Tokyo Teltech was also
suggested but Morita then found out that an American company had already used the
Teltech name. The name Sony came from two concepts, first being the Latin word
Sonus, which is the origin of the word sound and sonic. The second being the phrase
sonny boy stands for a young person with a free and pioneering spirit. Morita then crucially
asked that the new Sony name be on all packaging on products due to how the name perfectly
portrays the atmosphere of the company as a bunch of energetic people with the skills and
passion for unlimited innovation. The first Sony branded product, the TR-55 went on sale in
1955 followed by the pocket-sized TR-63 in 1957 and finally in 1958 Totsuko changed its
name to Sony Corporation officially ("Sony", 2014).

With the invention of the Walkman in 1979, Sony has transformed the way we listen to music
(Neate, 2014). Sony with its belief in the power of imagination- and its willingness to act
upon that power shall shine a light upon its past and shapes the future ("Sony", 2014).

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Theories

1. (1.48)With thorough and detailed planning, one can win.

Sun Tzu had always critically emphasized on the importance for careful planning. He
said, With careful and detailed planning, one can win; with careless and less detailed
planning, one cannot win. How much more certain is defeat if one does not plan at all!
From the way planning is done beforehand, we can predict victor or defeat (Sadik,
2014). Planning in business is defined as A basic management function involving
formulation of one or more detailed plans to achieve optimum balance of needs or
demands with the available resources. The planning process (1) identifies the goals or
objectives to be achieved, (2) formulates strategies to achieve them, (3) arranges or
creates the means required, and (4) implements, directs, and monitors all steps in their
proper sequence (planning, 2017). Thus by putting it in other words the theory states
that when the planning stage is carried out completely, carefully and the details are
gave careful attention, then anything we do will be successful (Dictionary.com, 2017)

Moving on towards with business terms, in the current industry strategic planning is a
must. Strategic planning is a modern day practice of Sun Tzus theory. It is a process
where the leader of the company would visualise goals and guide the company to
achieve it. Thus, a strategic plan would be a guideline showing whats going to
happen and ways to achieve the goal. A good example to what happens when one
does not practice this theory is Company A is a company that develops software to
keep and listen to music on a computer. Company A grew arrogant because the
software was so important to the customers and continued to sell and support their
product. The only planned for day to day operations and did not look at what was
happening in the market then suddenly Company B notices that customers want to be
able to listen to their music all the time and releases a product that could be carried
anywhere and is able to store and play songs. Thus virtually overnight Company As
product become obsolete and is in trouble because they had not created a strategic
plan (Kelley, 2003).

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2. (2.31) For the troops to plunder the resources of the enemy, they must be motivated
by material rewards.

Motivation plays a huge role in everything we do. For the soldiers to see the benefit of
defeating the enemy rewards are necessary. Thus, supplies, food, weapons,
ammunition, horses, slaves, or any material things of value must be taken from the
enemy at the end of the battle and be used as rewards for the soldiers because it is
vital to keep the soldiers focused and motivated for the next fight. When we see it in a
business perspective, spoils of war from organizations can be seen in the form of
profits, financial results and stocks that are won from defeating others in the modern
day battlefield called the market place. To keep their employees motivated and have a
high desire to perform, profits of a company that has a successful year must be used
as rewards for the employees. If the general of the company holds all the spoils of war
and the soldiers of the company are constantly told that there are no rewards thus a
sense of negativity would be for there. The quality of work wouldnt be up to par and
eventually the people would lose any motivation to win the next battle.

Employee will do the best only when they know that their higher ups would reward
them for their efforts, initiatives and performance. Thus a system that recognizes
employee performance and behaviour should be created. This is due to the similarity
in interest between the goal of both organization and employees where both benefit
from the final outcome. Board members, GMs, CEOs and/or owners should share
the spoils of war with their employees because it was by their effort and their sacrifice
that victory was achieved (Sadik, 2014).

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3. Attack the enemy when he is not prepared, Move, appear and strike at areas where the
enemy least expects you.

The main point to understand this quote is by understanding the two words; not prepared
and least expected. This quote has led to the development on a very important competitive
theory called Disruptive Innovation which portrays the quote in a modern way. To better
understand the quote we have to take a look at the two different categories in innovation,
sustaining innovation and disruptive innovation. Sustaining innovation is when big
companies compete with each other to make products that are better and can bring in more
money from more attractive customers. Whereas disruptive innovation is when a company
who is new to a market comes out with a cheaper, slimmer, and more convenient product that
appeals to a new or unattractive customer. Bigger companies are usually caught off guard
due to them being not prepared from both a cost structure and business model point of view,
having to take a step back to develop a lower quality and cheaper version of their lucrative
product. Meanwhile the new company is definitely more than ready to do just that.

One good example of the quote is shown by Wall Mart and Korean automakers entry into
markets in America. They brought in a new innovation called the Low-end whereby instead
of creating new markets or product, all they did were selling products that are considered
low-cost in the market back then. This market attracted customers who were no longer
attracted to the high-end products. These customers had enough of improved quality products
and now wanted low- cost products. This type of market catches the other companies who
were focused on improving their products off guard and hence succeeded in winning more
customers (El-Kadi, 2017).

4. Attack when forces and resources are more than abundant

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As the quote suggests, Sun Tzu says Attack when forces and resources are more than
abundant, defend when forces and resources are inadequate. When a general has more
soldier and resources in form of weapons and food compared to his enemy he should attack
whereas when a general doesnt have the above thus he should just defend instead of
attacking and risking defeat. From here it could be understood that the forces stated by Sun
Tzu are the manpower and workforce of a company, meanwhile resources would signify the
wealth of a company. When a company has abundance of both of those, it would be wise to
attack.

One good example would be Facebook acquiring Instagram. Facebook has been eyeing on
Instagrams photo sharing software for years, thus when Facebook has more than enough
money at hand, they bought Instagram at the price of $1 billion (Rusli, 2012). Facebook
realised that Instagram had the potential to destroy its future prospects since one of the main
function of Facebook is sharing pictures. If Facebook hadnt acquire Instagram back then its
net worth would be higher than it is and it carries the risk of getting bought by Facebooks
competitor Google thus acquiring Instagram was the correct move by Facebook (Hill, 2012).

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5. Thus the person adept at warfare seeks victory from the battle situations and conditions and
does not rely solely on the efforts of his officers and men. As such, he is able to select the
right men (officers and soldiers) and trust them to exploit the battle situations and conditions.

The battlefield is always changing and doesnt remain the same. Winning conditions changes
according to the battlefield so a person who is adept at warfare would always be thinking of
ways to win at the new battlefield and doesnt only rely on the effort of his officers and men.
As such, he can judge properly and is able to choose the appropriate person for the
appropriate job and is able to trust them to win according to the situation. Many times
officers and men after a long causes a lot of restriction and limitation thus to win the leader
must judge if such officers and men should remain in the battlefield.

One good example would be Chatime Malaysia which is now known as TeaLive, franchised
by Loob Holding. Due to a fall out between Loob Holding and La Kaffa, Loob Holding has
created their own brand. This is caused by and issue of ingredients used by Loob Holding.
After the fallout, Loob Holding was put on a new battlefield where they have lost their name,
thus stepping up they created their own brand. The owner himself invested a lot of money
and declared a loss of Rm10 million. They then use this chance to rebuild their brand and
supply chain but the benefit of all this is they no longer have to work under the restriction of
another company and now have the right to further expand into other country. This shows
that a leader does not only rely on his officers and soldiers and looks for a path to victory
from the situation at hand (Pikri, 2017).

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Discussion

With thorough and detailed planning, one can win. Sony is a company that practices
this quote quite well. One of Sonys examples of the quote can be seen from their marketing
strategy. Sony would try to sell the product by pricing them in a very strategic way. For
example, they would have a three tiered pricing strategy, which will attract customers from
the high-end range, middle class range and lastly the economical range. Besides that, Sony
Corporation would go for the price skimming strategy whenever they launch a new product,
which have new unseen features. What this means is that, Sony would charge a higher price
when a new product is launched then as time passes they would slowly decrease the price.
The main point of this strategy is to help milk in the maximum amount of profit when the
product is first launched and when the price decreases it will further enhance the amount of
sale from customers in a lower tier. This can be seen when Sony first released its first high
definition television back in 1990 and the mountain of a price was at $43,000. Then
gradually, the price dropped to $600 during 1993 and by the time it reached 2001, the price
has already dropped to $2000, a surprising $41,000 difference from when it first launched.
Another time was when Sony first sold its Walkman, the price was very high as compared to
its competitors but regardless, the market was still dominated by them due to the consistent
performance, highest quality and brilliant sound delivery by the Walkman (Bhasin, 2016).

Another great example would be Sonys battle against Microsoft in the gaming console
market. Back in 2005 when Sony released the Playstation3, their console was much more
expensive compared to their previous models and also the Xbox 360 and Nintendo Wii. The
PS3 was seen as too expensive by the consumers due to Xbox360 having the head start of
entering the market a year earlier whereas Wii introduced a whole new experience in gaming
by introducing a motion sensing wireless controller. From there Sony learned that what
gamers want the most is games and since they had weak line up of games thus causing them
to lose in the market. They lowered the price of the PS3 over and by the end of the sold 80
million consoles, almost the same as the Xbox360. For the release of PS4 however, Sony has
learnt from their mistakes. This time they entered the market one week earlier than Microsoft,
set the price of PS4 at $100 lower compared to the Xbox One and finally announced to the
world that the PS4 is simply the ultimate gaming platform (Frick, 2013).

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One other case of where Sony won with good planning is the battle between HD-DVD and
Blu-ray Disc. HD-DVD which is also known as DVD-Video 2.0 was created by Toshiba.
Many of the technological problems were fixed, and the discs could hold a data of 3 times the
old DVD but have the exactly identical dimensions as DVDs. Meanwhile the Blu-ray disc is
very similar to HD-DVD. They can both support the same audio channels and languages,
Java applications, internet connectivity and audio compression. The disc required technology
that is different from DVD discs thus manufacturers had to buy all the new equipment. The
winning point of Blu-ray was it is designed to withstand the challenge of time and can store
data equivalent to 10 times the usual DVD and is considered the premium format for 4k home
entertainment. Sony at first tried to win the format war by signing exclusive content deals
with 20th Century Fox, Walt Disney Pictures, and Sonys own Columbia Pictures. Toshiba
did the same thing thus resulting in market adoption of HD stalled. Buyers werent ready to
put money into this industry due to being unable to get all the movies they wanted. Sony saw
this chance and developed a master plan, since HD-DVD and Blu-ray players were still
priced more than $800, Sony installed their priced Blu-ray drive inside their third generation
PlayStation console which is the PS3. Sony is able to be one step ahead of their competitor
due to Blu-ray allowing larger games to be in the console compared to the usual DVD. The
main point was, from the media player perspective, the PS3 was only priced at US$499 and is
cheaper by hundreds of dollars compared to other players. In terms of sales, Sony lost an
estimated amount of more than $300 per unit. However, this allowed the Blu-ray players to
enter into consumer hands thus greatly impacted the production of home entertainment.
Slowly, film studios started migrating to the Blu-ray including Warner Brothers, Universal
Pictures and finally Paramount Pictures. These studios all announced they would stop
producing HD-DVDs. This clearly shows that, with a great plan one can win a battle no
matter how tough it is in the beginning (Clark, 2016).

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Moving on to next quote we have for the troops to plunder the resources of the enemy,
they must be motivated by material rewards. As suggested above in the theory section ,
employees will do their best only when they know that their higher ups would reward them
for their efforts, initiatives and performance. Thus a system that recognizes employee
performance and behaviour should be created. Sony has always tried to maintain their spot at
the top of technological development by building a lifestyle which is new for people
everywhere. In their quest to fulfil their target, Sony acknowledges that their employees are
their most vital resource. Sony could see how important it is to develop the special abilities of
each employee, building the best working environment, and create chances for employees to
enhance and showcase most of their capabilities and skills. Sony is working towards creating
an environment where employees can accept another persons differences, where nationality,
culture, race, gender and disabilities doesnt matter. Sony sees each employees as themselves
as an individual character, and that when they communicate amongst each other, they could
learn more about each other and learn new things. While recruiting and promoting employees
from different backgrounds, Sony would do their best to create a safe and healthy workplaces
that would factor in the lifestyles and life stages of people who work there and thus allowing
employees to see the benefit for fighting for this company (Corporation, 2017).

For career building Sony has always tried to push their employees into taking on new
challenges with the aim of helping to advance their career even further. In 1966, Sony would
then become the number one company in the Japanese industry to roll out an internal
recruitment program which has now been there for 50 years. This allows the group to choose
the correct person for the most appropriate roles, which in turn help strengthen their key parts
in the business and at the same time lighting the flame of the employees to challenge each
other. Currently, more than 7000 employees have qualified for this internal transfer program.
This program is now well known as an indispensable human resources system. Sony then
announced two new exciting human resource system in 2015. The first one was the free
agent system where outstanding employees are given the right to call themselves in-house
free agents. This system allows the employee to ask for transfer to different departments and
work in any field they want. Whereas the other system is called Career Plus, where the
employee would maintain his or her current position but is allowed to respond to in-house
recruitment calls to take a concurrent position or to join a project which is not in their current
department. This gifts employees with the chance to use their expertise and knowledge in a

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new environment while increasing the in-house networking. Sony would do all this to
encourage employees to stand up to new challenges, and would continue giving employees
the chance to enhance their career by boosting their experience within the Sony Group (Sony,
2016).

Adding on to the list of employee benefits, Sony always tries to allow their employees to
maintain good work-life balance. Measures taken to maintain employee good work-life
balance are target to help employees to work towards high performance levels. Sony realises
that employees would undergo period where they feel burnt out and low on energy and
understands that recovery is necessary in these cases. Sony provides a number of facilities to
aid in relieving employee stress and recovery on site. This would include chill- out rooms
where staff can use massage chairs so they could relax, and fun room where employee could
play games such as pool, table football and on a Sony Playstation. Sonys main office also
comes with a subsidised gym with personal trainer and numerous classes, and a restraint that
offers healthy food with high energy, and low G-I menu to help maintain the wellbeing of the
employees. All of this is done to make life easy for employees and apparently they even have
people coming in to do things like eyebrow shaping and also manicures. Besides facilities,
Sony also provides employees with a flexible working policy. This is due to they have
employees who have eldercare needs or some other circumstances, thus they wanted to have
more flexibility for the employees. What Sony did was, they increased the maximum amount
of holidays that employees could buy through the flexible benefits scheme, ranging from six
to seven weeks a year. Besides that, it also gives employees the chance to take three paid
days per year to perform voluntary work, which employees could either do it by themselves
or in a team. The companys best benefit is the staff discount on Sony products. It is almost
compulsory that every employee to have a Sony TV at home because it helps staffs to
become good ambassadors for the brand and it also helps employees to be up to speed with
all the new gizmos. Sonys overall philosophy towards the pros of benefit and reward in the
company is simple, it is to make sure that an employee is at sharp and motivated as they were
when they joined. This helps them to always be motivated to do the best for the company and
battle against other company as opposed to a company where the employees are just too tired
and in the end fired (Lovewell-Tuck, 2010).

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Next, we have attack the enemy when he is not prepared, Move, appear and strike at
areas where the enemy least expects you. This quote suggests that we should attack then
enemy when is not ready and doesnt know where you would attack from. Sony has a very
good example of this theory which is the introduction of the Walkman. The Sony Walkman
TPS-L2, fitted with big chunky buttons, leather case and headphones was introduced on July
1 1979. It even had a second earphone jack fitted so that two people could listen at once. This
all started when the co-founder of Sony Masaru Ibuka bringing a huge bulky TC-D5 cassette
recorder around to be able to listen to music. He then asked Norio Ohga, then Executive
Deputy President, to create a design where there was a playback-only stereo version which
functions mainly with the use of headphones. Ibuka then brought this to Chairman Akio
Morita and told him that this was a good idea. At first, Walkman was introduced in the U.S as
the Sound-About, meanwhile at the UK it was known as Stowaway but then thinking of
new uncopyrighted names for every different countries would be very costly. After a while,
Sony finally settled on the name Walkman for its similarity to the Sony Pressman, the
recorder the first Walkman prototype was based on. When it was first released, Sony
predicted that they would sell at most 5000 units a month but then surprisingly the Walkman
sold 50,000 units in the first two months. This is where the Sun Tzu theory comes in, Sony
wasnt the first in introducing a portable audio but Walkman has an unbeatable combination
of portability (runs on double A batteries) and privacy (has a headphone jack with no external
speakers) and this caused it to be the ideal product for many consumers who were out looking
for a compact portable stereo the could be brought with them anywhere. Many other
company who were still producing vinyl players couldnt compete with Sonys Walkman
because they didnt expect that something like that could be made hence allowing Sony to
win the market. Walkman was so successful that the name itself entered the Oxford English
Dictionary (Haire, 2009).

Another case would be the battle between Sonys Blu-ray and Toshibas HD-DVD. When
HD-DVD and Blu-ray players were still priced more than $800, Sony installed their priced
Blu-ray drive inside their third generation PlayStation console which is the PS3. Sony is able
to be one step ahead of their competitor due to Blu-ray allowing larger games to be in the
console compared to the usual DVD. The PS3 was only priced at US$499 and is cheaper by
hundreds of dollars compared to other players. In terms of sales, Sony lost an estimated
amount of more than $300 per unit. However, this allowed the Blu-ray players to enter into

12
consumer hands thus greatly impacted the production of home entertainment. Slowly, film
studios started migrating to the Blu-ray including Warner Brothers, Universal Pictures and
finally Paramount Pictures. These studios all announced they would stop producing HD-
DVDs. This is a fine example of Toshiba not expecting that Sony would actually incorporate
their Blu-ray player into the PS3 even though it caused them to be at loss. Since Toshiba
didnt expect it, thus when it actually happened, they couldnt respond accordingly causing
them to exit the market without being actually able to fight. This shows how the theory could
be used by attacking the enemy when they arent prepared and strike where they least expect
it.

Attack when forces and resources are more than abundant. This theory was used by
Sony when they had a joint venture with Ericsson. Sony was already a huge company back
then and they had world leading consumer electronics expertise. Thus the biggest reason why
Sony had a joint venture with Ericsson was because they held technological knowledge in the
sector of communication. Before Sony, chips were bought by Ericsson from Philips only but
then a huge loose fire erupted at Philips causing Ericsson to be unable to acquire their chips
and this caused them to face a huge lost. They were in such deep waters due to them being
unable to fulfil the deadlines for their orders, which in turn caused their market share to fall
that they were almost forced to sell their handset division. That was until the found a ray of
hope by joining hands with Sony that could help them get back on their feet. The joint
venture of Sony Ericsson was formed on October 1st 2001 (UK Essays, 2015).

Sony wanted Ericssons superb telecommunications technology, especially more its technical
wireless expertise and also to compete with market leader at that time, Nokia Corp, in a very
competitive market, they needed Ericssons market share. Ericssons aim was to increase the
standing of the company, in terms of financial and technological, and with the highest set as
being able to produce phones that could rival Nokias, which the market leader was back
then. Sony had access to the Japanese market which wasnt very open back then, and they
had the knowledge to do well in the entertainment technology and design, thus the only thing
the lacked to do well in the market was Ericssons mobile platform and state of art mobile
technology. Besides that, Sony also has technology for music, audio, imaging and video
entertainment that could be advantageous for Sony because it allows them to produce a whole

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new type of innovative type of phone that has never ever been made in the market. Since the
amount of share Sony has in the market in nearly four times lesser than Ericsson in the
industry, thus when compared, the presence of Sony in the European market was very
miniscule and thus a partnership with Ericsson would be a way to make their name known in
the market. Ericsson has the problem where, despite them having prime quality phones, their
phone didnt suit the taste of consumers in the market causing their phone to be unable to sell.
Thus when combined, Ericsson would give Sony access to one of the worlds largest existing
customer base and also the huge amount of knowledge of mobile infrastructure which is from
all over 140 countries. This way, Sony would have the cutting edge technology of Ericsson
and along with Sonys highly competitive marketing campaigns, they would complement
each other perfectly (Essay UK, 2017).

After Sony Ericsson was form, the became quite successful, running on their proprietary OS,
they released a phone T68i which made phone interesting in a time where phone were very
dull and boring. The phone offered an innovative design with curved edges, a 256 colour
display and a joystick in place of navigation buttons, making this phone the benchmark for
mobile phones back then. Despite being priced at $650 each, which was very expensive back
then, many still bought the phone because of the thrill it gave when using it. Then a year
later, a whole new concept of premium phone was born as phones were getting bigger. Sony
then released the T610 which offers a stunning 65,000 colour display with 128x160 pixels
resolution with a black and silver colour scheme and also of course, their trademark joystick.
This phone again increased the benchmark at which other phone had to follow due to its
premium design and mind blowing display. Then after that, Sony Ericsson released the
K750i, which started the camera spec war, which until today still continues. The K750i at that
time was certainly one of the best to use and with MMS starting to encourage picture sharing,
the 2MP camera was perfect. Finally, after Sony Ericson realised that focusing on particular
features enable them to win the market, thus K800i was the result of this realisation. The
Cybershot technology from Sony was brought from Sonys camera to Sony Ericsson phones.
This phone features a 3.2MP camera which further leaves other competitors behind, and
allowing this to be Sony Ericssons bestselling phone and setting the high up in the market
and the market leader at that time (Gondhia, 2015). This has shown us that Sun Tzus theory
was put to well use by Sony and it allowed them to be successful at that time.

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Finally we have Thus the person adept at warfare seeks victory from the battle
situations and conditions and does not rely solely on the efforts of his officers and men.
As such, he is able to select the right men (officers and soldiers) and trust them to
exploit the battle situations and conditions. This is shown by Sony when they broke off
the joint venture between them and the Ericsson Company. Back when Sony Ericsson was
still at its greatest, they owned a total of 9% share of the global mobile phone market. They
were a well-known phone manufacturer and were the fourth largest in the world. Since then,
a lot of things have changed in the market. The mobile was no longer a huge block which
could only call and send text messages, it has now transformed into a pocket computer. The
idea of a smartphone has become a reality and is now mass produced to a mass market but
Sony Ericsson could not keep up with the trend and speed of their competitor hence they got
the short end of the stick. In the middle of 2011, their market share has descended to a
meagre amount of 2% and is ranked only at the 11th from the list of phone manufacturers.
Bryan Ma from IDC Asia-Pacific said They originally came together to incorporate the
Ericsson technology and the Sony brand, but they have not been able to achieve much with
the combination.(Singh, 2011)

One of the problems faced by Sony Ericsson is they could not go up straight against the top
guns of the mobile phone manufacturing industry. Sony Ericsson could not see the
importance of having the best Research and Development tools and techniques. Hence they
could not innovate their products fast enough to cater towards the taste of customers causing
them to lose to other competitors. Besides that, Sony Ericsson also could not cater towards
different markets effectively. This is due to after making the joint venture, they started
making phones without actually knowing what the customers wanted hence causing them to
have to remove their products line from the markets due to the losses they face. The joint
venture also invested a lot without getting to know what the current customer wants and
needs. This mistake can be seen in 2003, where Sony Ericsson continued making phones that
were expensive whereas other mobile phones were experiencing a price cut. This caused
them to not be able to make as much profit as they first predicted. Sony Ericsson could not be
successful because they could not achieve the set date profit that was set by both companies.
Sony wanted the results as soon as possible but Ericsson could not keep up with Sonys
expectations and was not making expected profits. To counter this, they had to cut off a lot of

15
jobs and also closed off research centres that were operating internationally. This caused
them their Research and Development speed, making them behind their competitors. Both
companies of the joint venture were not working towards the goals that were set by them.
Sony was anxious because they wanted the market share in mobile phone manufacturing
industry whereas Ericsson was anxious because they wanted their industry reputation back.
Hence when both companies could not look towards the same goal, they tend to fall apart
(UK Essays, 2015).

On October 27, 2011 Sony announced that they would be acquiring their joint venture
partner, Ericssonss shares in the joint venture. Sony Corp would pay a total amount of 1.05
euros ($1.5billion), to acquire the shares, so that they can further develop their smartphones
music and video feature so that they can match up to the current market leader such as Apple
Inc. Sony wants to take full control of their smartphone department so that it is easier for
them to add in features and merge their smartphone devices with its array of content, from
movie studio to its Play Station and also music label with stars like Beyonce and Britney
Spears. Sonys Chairman Sir Howard Stinger told a news conference in London Its the
beginning of something which I think is quite magical, we can more rapidly and more widely
offer consumers smartphones, laptops, tablets, and televisions that seamlessly connect with
one another and open up new worlds of online entertainment. It could be seen here that Sony
is choosing the right person for the job according to the situation because the battlefield is no
longer the same. Before this Sony has to separate their consumer electronics devices and
games from the phones they made back when they were still Sony Ericsson. Sony has looked
at the current battlefield and realised that smartphone is going to be important because
although people still use television but they are viewing a lot more content through their
phone compared to the television (Virki, 2011).

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Conclusion

From the first part we could see that Sony actually practices Sun Tzus theory where With
thorough and detailed planning, one can win. They have a great way of marketing their
product, especially the three tiered pricing strategy which can attract customers from all 3 tier
of the market. This plan allows the all sorts of customers to buy their products and would
enhance the amount of sale they could get from the customers. Besides that, they also showed
their brilliantness at planning by having a greater line up of games compared to their
competitor, allowing them to win and dominate the launching of their product. This can also
be seen at the case where they released their Blu-ray disc, at first they were at a stalemate
with their competitor HD-DVD, but then they planned their comeback by inserting a Blu-ray
player into their third generation Play Station allowing Blu-ray players to be easily available
in many customers home thus allowing them to come out ahead of the competitor. Then for
the second part where For the troops to plunder the resources of the enemy, they must be
motivated by material rewards, Sony showed this by rewarding their employee well when
they did their best. They created a working environment where nationality, race, gender, and
disabilities would not matter. Sony would do their best to create a safe and healthy
environment. Furthermore they were the first in the Japanese industry to roll out an internal
recruitment program allowing them to choose the correct person for the correct job. Sony
allows employee who are outstanding to choose to transfer to any department they felt like
working and also give them the chance to join a project which is not in their current
department hence allowing employee to experience new things and giving them the chance to
further enhance their career. Sony also makes sure that their employee maintains a good
work-life balance by giving them workplace benefits and flexible working days. Sony also
gives employee discount for their products. Next, for the theory Attack the enemy when he
is not prepared, move, appear and strike at areas where the enemy least expects you. As
shown in the discussion, Sony did use this theory especially in the part where they were
selling their Walkman. Sony created a product where no other company at that time could
make and by releasing throughout the world, their company soared with sales because it was
wanted by people all over the world and only they had this product hence showing that Sony
did attack their enemy when they were not prepared and had strike at areas where the enemy
least expects them. This is also shown when Sony put their Blu-ray player into their 3rd
generation Play Station allowing Blu-ray players to be available in consumers home easily

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hence boosting their sales and allow them to come out on top of their competitor the HD-
DVD. Moving on to the theory attack when forces and resources are more than abundant,
we could see this when Sony had a joint venture with Ericsson. Sony at that time had an
abundance of resources in forms of money, technology, and marketing strategy. What they
had lacked was the patent towards mobile phone technology and presence in the international
mobile phone market. Coincidently, Ericsson at that time was facing a huge problem to fulfil
their deadlines due to their only suppliers factory being burned down. Hence when the joint
venture was formed, Sony could use their resources to attack the global market while using
technologies patented by the Ericsson Company. They went on to have the ability to compete
with market leaders and become quite successful for a certain amount of time but as time
passes, slowly they began to be unable to compete with other competitors because their
Research and Development department could not release new technology as fast as other
competitors. This caused Sony to now move on and use the theory Thus the person adept at
warfare seeks victory from the battle situations and conditions and does not rely solely on the
efforts of his officers and men. As such, he is able to select the right men (officers and
soldiers) and trust them to exploit the battle situations and conditions. This caused Sony to
buy out the shares of Ericsson in the joint venture because what Ericsson could bring on the
table for Sony was no longer enough. Sony wanted to integrate their smartphones with their
consumer electronics to create an interface where everything of theirs could be
interconnected using their smartphone. Back when Ericsson was there, they could not do this
so Sony realised that Ericsson was no longer the correct person to be chosen for the current
battlefield, and hence chosen someone else who is more suited for the situation and condition
to take over and seek victory for their company.

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Table of Content

Content Page

Introduction 1-2

Theories 3-7

Discussion 8-16

Conclusion 17-18

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