Phil Molyneux
BGR reports that Sony kicked top executive Phil Molyneux to the curb after terrible U.S. sales. This isn’t directly related to the digital camera business. But it’s one more sign of the difficult time almost all electronic giants are facing. Let’s hope Sony CEO Hirai will find the way out of this crisis. At least on the digital camera front Sony did quite many things right with in 2013. Let’s hope 2014 will be even better!
33 Responses
That’s probably to the agressives marketing strategy of mainly Samsung in mobile phones and TV business. Many customers all over the world get tricked by them and other companies with mostly superior products (Apple, Sony and many other that made high quality over last decades) have to suffer.
The Japanese electronic companys destroyed many European companies in the 80s and 90s due to cheaper electronics. Today the same thing tends to happen with Japanese companies due to the Koreans and Chinese because these can produce even cheaper and just copy everything with no mercy.
Why America? Well, customers there are probably one of the easiest victims for agressive commercials and economic crysis also forces them to buy the perceived “cheaper product”. But at the end the cheaper product is mostly not the one that lasts longer, see Samsungs TVs and phones. I prefer spending 30% more and using the product for twice the time. At the and that almost always came cheaper than the “cheap way”. People, change your consumption behaviour! Cheap price isn’t the way to go. Give quality and the companies that produce it some chance.
*This is all my personal opinion. I’m not biased, not working for any electronics companie and didn’t invest in one of them. I just want to preserve some quality products in this world that I can buy for myself and I also want others to enjoy them. All of us consumers can steer this quality everyday day by choosing the right products.
it also have to do with Sony making several strategic mistakes like not investing in OLED displays early like samsung, instead it is pushing for 4K which I think is still 5 years away from fully adopted by consumers.
+1
To be fair Hans,there have been no shortage of quality control issues with a goodly number of Sony products. As for Apple,they have managed to convince buyers to pay more for a manufactured “coolness” for products that typically offer less for more than comparable products from other less “cool”manufacturers.
The fact that there are indeed some expensive products that are crap doesn’t really change Hans’ point. As for Apple, I would like to hear which products offer less for more?
jwdoy – I’m with Vlad on this one. Name ONE. Just ONE product from a competitor at a lower price that offers the design aesthetics, build quality, attention to detail and materials used that is equal in all aspects to an Apple product. You can’t. I understand in that you could get a computer with processors that are just as fast, or even faster, but when you load up an identically equipped product you can’t match it. Billeted aluminum cases, hidden hinges, lightness and connectivity – just look at the MacBook Air – no one has matched that yet, though they are trying. For some there are Dells that are good enough, and for others there are Apples.
Well, regarding Apple vs. Samsung, what’s more expensive: To develop a complete smartphone OS and the hardware around it, and keep innovating by releasing one ground-breaking idea after another, or to just copy the hardware and design concept, put some blinky chrome on top of a free OS and pack it all together with off-the-own-shelf electronics components?
But consumers tend to see what meets the eye, and rarely beyond.
+1 Unfortunately, it is so bad, that for some types of products you don’t even have quality options.
Good! Hope Sony find it’s way back.
Well,,I don’t know about the Cellphone Biz but as far as the Camera Biz goes there is just about Zero advertising in the US. All I see are a few adds in the Camera Mags (and these readers already know about the Cams). They have to get to the People who don’t read this stuff. There were Zero adds for the new SLT Tech and many People still don’t know it exist because all “Big Cams or DSLRs” look the same to the average Joe and all you see at BestBuy etc. are C and N and the salesmen are Sony Blind.. and there are NO TV adds like Nikon or Canon have. NONE.
Sony , Get out there and display your Tech for the World to see,, get a SuperBowl Spot !! Sheesh. Its not that Hard
even watching huluplus I see advert for fuji. I don’t what sony is up to.
It is quite true that Sony has little “traditional” advertising of its higher end camera products (pop up ads on websites are prevalent, but I don’t consider that “traditional” advertising it the efficacy of such ads is not yet proven). What advertising I have seen in places such as photo magazines is horrible (in my view) providing almost no useful information about the camera advertised and not much in the way of a reason to get it. All they do is provide notice that the product is available, but little as to why someone should buy it over something else. This continues with the ads for the A7R that have run in the past month or so. However, notwithstanding the lame advertising Sony does, when it does advertise, I also understand from folks at Sony that the marketing budget for Sony in the US is determined in Japan, and that it’s not enough to allow a sustained advertising campaign for any of Sony’s cameras. There is a short-term focus on one product, as there is now with the A7R/A7, but after that short-term ends there will be little or nothing, with advertising shifting to the next “new” product. There are many other aspects to Sony’s relatively dismal sales results in the US, including poor visibility in retail stores, less available product in retail stores, lack of support for higher end products, less support for retailers, and more. Whether changing the top executive in the US will make much difference remains to be seen, particularly if budget and other restrictions are imposed from Japan.
If you get Popular Photography, they have the “Edge” supplemement that comes out every other month or so. This supplement is dedicated to Sony shooters and equipment and is sponsored by Sony. Edge is actually well done, in my opinion.
In my earlier comments I forgot to mention the Edge publication, which is something unique. But, if you look through the most recent edition, the primary emphasis is promoting the new cameras, mostly the A7R/A7 (with a tiny blurb about the RX10). There are some editorial-type “articles” about Sony shooters that reference the photographer using the A99, and a very short article about Sony’s video game production team using banks of A99’s (i.e. a Sony division using Sony cameras). But that’s it. The “ads” that appear on the pages (as opposed to the “editorial” content – given that the whole thing really is advertising I’m using quotes to distinguish between the appearance of the material presented) are dedicated to the A7R, with two pages for independent advertising (Zeiss Touit lenses and a Manfrotto tripod). It most definitely is a Sony promotion, but limited in reach to only subscribers of Popular Photography magazine.
On any given night of primetime TV watching or weekend of sports watching in the USA, we will see 5-10 Canon camera product commercials and maybe one or 2 Nikon ones. You will never see a Sony, Olympus, Fuji, Panasonic, Ricoh, camera advertisement. I the USA, TV commercials are what sell products. Yes TV advertising is insanely expensive in the USA, especially for big time sports events, but the reach that these commercials have is really incredible.
Many if not most of those ads are on cable television programming, which is generally much less expensive than broadcast network primetime TV (which generally has larger audiences and is thus more expensive). Canon and Nikon also back up their TV advertising by having their products widely available and easy to find in various stores. That is not the case for Sony and some of the other brands, which often are hard to find, particularly outside of the largest markets (i.e., big cities). Ultimately, it’s not just one thing as all of the marketing efforts need to come together and get proper support from the distribution channels and dealers/retailers. Many of the latter don’t carry Sony products, or if they do only a few of them, making it hard for someone to check out a Sony product before making a buying decision, or buying locally if they are so inclined (as opposed to buying online).
Dear Sony,
Can you kick the man responsible for the F60 catastrophe too? Thanks.
Or make him fix every single one for free although I suspect it is probably a few people as the 43 58 and 60 suffer from overheating. What is funny is as the number grows the problem grow because the flash with the least problems start with the 43.I sold all my sony flash and just use much cheaper manual flash until they fix this issue if ever.
The F58 does not suffer from overheating the way the F60 does. I have both and they are not anywhere near the same in this regard. All flashes will shut-down when they overheat. The problem is that the F60 does it much faster than any other previous Sony (or Minolta) flash that I have used (5400, 5600, 56, 58 and 60). The problem with the F60 is unique, and bad.
Good.
Right decision by Sony.
Was Mr Molyneux calling the shots or was it Sony head office?
How much say did he have in product development & pricing?
How well did the competition do?
Sony sales have been lack lustre for some years. Lots of red ink on the bottom line, World wide, not just in the US.
An interesting development. Most interesting is the timing, still the middle of U.S. holiday season (which continues through the sales after Xmas, when people spend again after receiving gift cards, and money as gifts, and/or amplify a gift of a camera with an accessory, lens, flash & etc…), but right before the full-on availability of the new cameras and lenses and the release of the coming models.
But the TV segment is a mess, and probably so is the computer and tablet/phone segment. Sony is practically out of the game in the U.S. with phones. In computers there are so many options, as is true of TV’s, home stereo. Forget about DVD players and audio only stuff. And there’s no Sony traction any longer in portable music players vs. Apple and now Samsung phones.
Sony’s got a problem. I hope it doesn’t drag the camera division down with it.
Well, perhaps if they start releasing photographic products at a “reasonable” price, comparable to its competitors, then they would have stronger sales figures.
As an example, the 70-200 G II A-mount for $3000? Seriously? Even the equivalent Canon and Nikon don’t cost $3000 and their versions have on-lens image stabilization. The old 70-200 G, a 10 years old design from Minolta, while still excellent, should not cost $2000.
It costs 15% more than the Canon and you actually have in-body stabilization. And, btw, the Canon 70-200 non IS from 1995 costs 1500$ at BH.
Precisely. The benefit of in-body stabilization is that the lenses need not have image stabilization, which should make the lens less expensive to manufacture, not more and certainly not 15% more than a stabilized equivalent.
As for the old Canon 70-200, yes, $1500 is 25% ($500) cheaper than the equivalent Sony. Personally, $500 is a considerable amount of money that can be better spent.
Do you really think that prices are based simply on productions costs? Sony is offering the same overall value, why would they make it cheaper? Also, no idea why the Sony is 15% more expensive, but a good guess is that they have a smaller market share.
As to the old Canon, I mentioned it simply to show that older lenses can be quite expensive too. It doesn’t really compare to the Minolta 70-200, precisely because you are not getting any stabilization (it should be compared to the first 70-200 IS, but there isn’t a price for it at BH, so I left it out).
A further problem with this is that the new 70-200/2.8 G II has the same optics as the old lens it replaces, except for the addition of nano AR lens coatings. It also has a bit fast AF and weather sealing. But, is that worth $3,000 compared to the lens it replaces? Absolutely not. The latest Canon and Nikon 70-200/2.8 lenses have much improved optics over the lenses they replace, include VR, and weather sealing. Yet they are much less expensive than the new Sony lens. Sony’s pricing of the new lens is totally unjustifiable.
I echo the comment that Sony has no presence here in the USA, with the possible exception of some PS4 advertising.
It’s like they think they’re so great that they need not make any effort, and that people will come TO THEM.
That works with some luxury brands, Leica for instance. Maybe Sony overestimates its brand.
Thinking about it, even Hasselblad buys advertising space in Monocle, and I see Hermes ads in other luxury lifestyle publications.
Maybe that’s the direction Sony needs to move its advertising efforts.
I was overjoyed when SONY bought Minolta because they inherited Minolta’s superb interface and ergonomics which IMHO is second to none but sadly they also inherited Minolta’s inability to advertise and make themselves known as a major player. I have converted both amateurs and pros to the SONY system by demonstrating its virtues and almost everyone said I had no idea that the SONY system was so capable. Hats off to SONY for its innovations but it is time to EXTOL them and to educate the general population that SONY is a major player and that their DSLRs have merit. IF YOU WANT TO BE A MAJOR PLAYER THEN START ACTING LIKE ONE… PUBLIC PERCEPTION IS IMPORTANT.
Totally agree here.
+1