Interesting news from the Boy Genius Report, now, where it’s being reported that Sony are in talks to buy out Ericsson’s shares of their joint venture, giving the Japanese electronics giant sole control of the Sony Ericsson brand. Which is handy, because at the same time, the speculation is that Ericsson want out of the deal, to drop mobile phone involvement altogether, and concentrate on the back-end stuff you never see, like cell towers, and network infrastructure.
It should be pointed out that the evidence for that is based on pure rumour and speculation, but what would it mean if it did happen?
Well, it’s hard to say, but one thing that might stand more of a chance if it was just Sony running the show, is a PSP-phone. Sony have held back from letting Sony Ericsson use the PSP brand for ages, as they had specific ideas about what it should and shouldn’t be like. Without Ericsson in the mix, they may be able to bring it to fruition in the way they want to see it.
Of course, it would mean a rebranding of any new phones, I would imagine, with just the Sony name on them. Whether that will apply to phones that have been announced, but that won’t be released till later in the year, is anybody’s guess. All I’ll say is that they’d better not can the Sony Ericsson Idou, or their punishment shall be protracted and very messy…
Ericsson representatives declined to comment on what is basically nothing more than rumour and speculation, but I will point out that it’s not the first time we’ve heard rumours of Ericsson wanting out, and Sony wanting more control.
We shall have to see what transpires…
More news as it happens! And be sure to subscribe now to get all the latest action from the world of mobile phones!
March 24th, 2009 at 5:26 pm
[...] week, I ran a story about Ericsson seemingly getting cold feet about their joint venture with Sony, and about Sony wanting to buy out their Swedish partner. Well, [...]