Kazuo Hirai, Sony’s upcoming president and CEO, has recently hinted that Vita OS might make an appearance on future Sony phones and tablets. Vita OS is the operating system that powers the Playstation Vita. At a Q&A session with reporters Hirai stated that he doesn’t want people to forget that Vita OS is not just a gaming platform, but has the potential to be a powerful mobile OS as well.
Sony’s Senior Vice President, Yoshio Matsumoto, is reported as saying:
“If you’re asking if we’ve made it in a way that’s expandable, so that it’s possible to apply to smartphones and tablets on top of achieving the high responsiveness we need for gaming devices — it is possible. That doesn’t mean that we’re applying it to smartphones and tablets at this point in time, but it’s been designed with expandability in mind.”
Sony, who recently acquired Sony Ericsson, posted a $325 million loss for fiscal 2011, stating that intense competition in the lower end Android market has hurt their bottom line, despite a year-on-year increase in Xperia Android smartphone sales of a healthy 65%. Even though Matsumoto states that they’re not “applying it to smartphones and tablets at this point in time,” it makes perfect sense for them to start thinking about making the move. Focusing on what Sony does best… gaming… might provide a competitive advantage in a fierce market where unique differentiators are what can make the difference in whether a company sinks or swims.
It seems like Sony’s strategy is still not 100% decided, seeing as just last October Hirai was in discussions with non-Sony companies regarding use of their Playstation Suite for Android SDK.
What do you think? Should Sony stick it out with Android, or focus more on their Vita OS?