Sony Ericsson posts strong Q4 earnings |
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Wed, 18 Jan 2006 18:40
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STOCKHOLM, Sweden - Mobile phone manufacturer Sony Ericsson posted record fourth quarter earnings thanks to the huge demand for handsets with cameras and walkmans, the company announced on Wednesday.
Pre-tax profits for the fourth quarter were pegged at €206 million up from the €140 million registered in the fourth quarter of 2004. Sony Ericsson said that the number of phoned that were shipped by it rose by 28 percent on a year-on-year basis to 16.1 million.
"This was another solid quarter for Sony Ericsson, and has enabled us to finish the year with great momentum. We are now seeing the benefit of our earlier investments in R&D," Miles Flint, president of Sony Ericsson said. "We've grown very strongly at the high end but we're not slugging it out at the low end. Our strategy is to bring differentiation and that's a prime consideration rather than volume and market share for its own sake."
Sony Ericsson has targeted the top end of the mobile market, but is yet to focus on supplying basic mobile handsets to growing economies like India and China. Mr Flint added that Sony Ericsson would maintain the target of achieving 9 percent growth in 2006, but that the overall mobile market, which grew by leaps and bounds in the last year would slow down to around 10 percent growth in this year.
The company, which is an equal joint venture of Sony of Japan and Ericsson of Sweden, said that the launch of Walkman phones had enabled it to grow rapidly, "The fourth quarter witnessed very strong sequential market growth which Sony Ericsson matched, resulting in a record quarter in terms of volume, sales and net income," the company said in a statement. The company said that it had sold 3 million Walkman phones since its inception in August 2005.
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