Sony Mobile saw increased sales in the last fiscal year thanks to a shift from feature phones to smartphones.
Sony as a whole posted its first profit in five years, the BBC reported, with net profit of ¥43 billion ( £279 million) on the back of increased sales, up 4.7% compared with last year, due to the consolidation of Sony Mobile and the “favourable impact of foreign exchange rates.”
This profit compared with a net loss of ¥457 billion ( £2.97 billion) with the year before.
Meanwhile, Sony Mobile saw increased sales of mobile phones, which was due primarily to higher average selling prices, the company said. This reflected its shift from feature phones to smartphones and higher unit sales of smartphones.
The increase in mobile phone sales, which Sony said would have been roughly 18 per cent had the division been consolidated for the entire fiscal year, was “significant”, Sony said.
Sony’s income as a whole for the fourth quarter was ¥94 billion ( £610 million) compared with a net loss of ¥255.2 billion in the same quarter last fiscal year.
The company’s 2014 outlook for mobile was sunny also: overall sales were expected to increase “significantly” due to an expected increase in sales of smartphones and the introduction of “high value-added models”, which could be a hint at future flagship models to succeed the Xperia Z.
