Sony Thurs. reported a 55.3% 3rd-quarter net profit increase on lower equity in net income of affiliated companies, despite a 7.5% decline in revenue and 13% drop in operating income.
Paul Gluckman, Executive Senior Editor, is a 30-year Warren Communications News veteran having joined the company in May 1989 to launch its Audio Week publication. In his long career, Paul has chronicled the rise and fall of physical entertainment media like the CD, DVD and Blu-ray and the advent of ATSC 3.0 broadcast technology from its rudimentary standardization roots to its anticipated 2020 commercial launch.
Sony Thurs. reported a 55.3% 3rd-quarter net profit increase on lower equity in net income of affiliated companies, despite a 7.5% decline in revenue and 13% drop in operating income.
New Sirius CEO Mel Karmazin Wed. used his first quarterly conference call in that post to throw water on speculative news reports his company was in merger talks with rival XM.
Online DVD rentals are a $650 million business that’s doubling every year, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings told analysts in the company’s quarterly conference call. Such a vibrant market “attracts serious competition,” and Blockbuster in the last 6 months “has thrown everything but the kitchen sink at us,” Hastings said. “Yet we have continued to grow and retain our customers at record rates.”
Cable industry suppliers are working to comply with the July 2006 integration ban on set-top boxes, Comcast told the FCC in an ex parte filing. But unless the rule is changed or the deadline delayed within the next several weeks -- a solution cable has been pushing -- “a large and growing proportion of the finite technical resources of cable industry suppliers and cable operators will need to be dedicated toward meeting that deadline,” Comcast said. It said it was responding to questions raised by FCC Chmn. Powell on how soon cable needed a decision from the Commission whether the ban should be maintained, eliminated or postponed and how cable would use the time if the deadline were extended or scrapped. Comcast said cable already had entered the 18-month window usually necessary to design, test and produce set-top boxes. But efforts to comply with the integration ban “will require diversion of resources away from other matters, such as the development of a next-generation network architecture security for cable services that is reliable, renewable and downloadable and the development of very low-cost digital set-top boxes,” it said. If the FCC grants cable’s request for a delay in the integration ban, Comcast said, cable would use its “continuing support” for CableCARDs during the interim to “further prove that the industry is meeting its commitments to provide and support separate security without having to deprive customers of the integrated set-top boxes that millions of consumers are happy to use today.” Cable also would use the time to continue its intensive work on downloadable security, and might have a “workable” solution in place by year-end if resources aren’t diverted to integration ban compliance, Comcast said. It also pledged cable would use any postponement to work “vigorously and cooperatively” in the 2-way plug-&-play negotiations. “But of course the prospects for progress there are also dependent upon the behavior of many non-cable parties and the business issues being dealt with in those negotiations,” Comcast said.
The LCD industry’s “supply-demand balance” will begin to stabilize 2nd quarter before showing “signs of strengthening later in the year,” LG.Philips LCD Pres. Ron Wirahadiraksa told financial analysts Mon. in the company’s 4th quarter conference call.
Greater-than-expected price deterioration in TVs, DVD recorders and video cameras was a key reason Sony downgraded its forecast on sales and operating income for the fiscal year ending March 31, the company said Thurs. However, a sharp reduction in Sony’s income tax obligation due to “a sound outlook for the operating performance” at its U.S. subsidiaries spurred the company to boost its net income projection Yen 40 billion from its Oct. forecast.
TiVo “has little confidence” the CableCARD-ready HD PVR it introduced at CES for its next-generation “Tahiti” service strategy (CED Jan 7 p11) “would be supported adequately by cable operators or find acceptance among cable subscribers,” it told the FCC in an ex parte filing (MB 97-80).
U.S. videogame retail sales fell 1% last year to $9.9 billion but unit sales climbed 4%, the NPD Group reported Tues. “This was a year that was really dominated by really great software sales and really great titles,” Anita Frazier, NPD analyst, told reporters in a conference call.
Just a day after his investor group lost out to Movie Gallery in its Hollywood Entertainment buyout bid, Hollywood CEO Mark Wattles on Tues. bought a majority of financially ailing Ultimate Electronics and became its chmn., it was disclosed Wed. in an SEC filing. The same day, Ultimate also filed for Chapter 11 protection in U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Del.
Just after Hollywood Entertainment CEO Mark Wattles disclosed to the SEC that he has begun negotiations with Ultimate Electronics on “a wide range of possible transactions,” including additional investment in the financially ailing retailer, Movie Gallery announced a definitive agreement Mon. to acquire the Hollywood chain for $13.25 per share. The deal amounts to about $850 million in cash, plus the assumption of $350 million in debt.