![Sony's Stocks Fly As Market Responds to New Corporate Hierarchy 1](https://images.pushsquare.com/7e57c0a090f0f/sonys-stocks-fly-as-market-responds-to-new-corporate-hierarchy-1.900x.jpg)
Sony’s stocks soared to a record breaking ¥3,527 (~$22) today in the aftermath of its corporate reshuffle announcement.
Earlier, the Japanese manufacturer confirmed that celebrated executive Hiroki Totoki will take over as the organisation’s CEO from 1st April. Having already steered PlayStation to significant profits, the market expects similar results across Sony as a whole.
As part of the changes, the company also confirmed that Hideaki Nishino will be elevated as PlayStation’s sole CEO, while Hermen Hulst will remain on hand to lead the firm’s first-party studios.
Sony’s stock has been steadily increasing for a while now, but strong performances from its various subsidiaries has made the market bullish. Some have even suggested that a contributing factor to its recent rise could be attributed to the firm’s relatively tariff resistant nature, due to its focus on content, like games, movies, and music.
All in all, it’s a pretty good time for Sony on the corporate side, and a dramatic change from the PS3 era, when it was in something of a company-wide rut.
[source nikkei.com, via gurufocus.com, automaton-media.com]
Comments 24
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Would have went higher if they fired Herman and got shu back in.
Finance guy is new CEO. It is as good signal for investor as it can be.
But it will be good for consumers? That's another question.
They need only to remove Hermen Hulst and they’ll have a winner chessboard.
Explain this to me in Fortnite terms.
Try that again, shall I?
Nobody in the online world or business world seems to think Hermen is competent, based on these results and the general discourse of his tenure.
He has much to do to rebuild his credibility. Maybe too much.
Standard market overreaction to news that doesn't fundamentally change how a company will operate
@Atreus97 That's not true. Hulst had a great reputation at Guerrilla which got him the gig in the first place. He's since also signed a deal with Kojima to make a new espionage game and has overseen several first-party hits, including their fastest-selling game ever in Helldivers 2.
Obviously the stuff with Concord was not good and I'm a little sceptical of some of his decisions, but they clearly still have confidence in him.
Nobody wanted all these live service titles, yet Hulst is the bad guy for cancelling them? Why not rip the bandaid off now instead of wasting even more money finalizing, launching, and (maybe) supporting these bemoaned games?
@get2sammyb
I get that. I'm exaggerating but even you say he "HAD" a great reputation from his work from Guerilla.
But now?
Helldivers is a success but it's seen as a convenient accident. He's had more misses than hits recently so the general feeling around him doesn't seem to be positive, and now even the market reflects that.
@get2sammyb it's not just concord though, there's been like 7 game cancellations, multiple studio closures, and many teams are not even going to release a game this gen. Than it's just bad decisions like having blue point work on a live service title, having naughty dog make factions only to be almost finished with it and cancelling it because they didn't realize that they had to continue to support it after launch. I can go on and on but the point is failure ultimately comes down to the person in charge who has been Herman since 2019.
@Atreus97 not to mention helldivers 2 was in development before he took over.
@Americansamurai1 To be fair, through the history of time, games have always ended up getting cancelled.
Obviously it doesn't look great from the outside, and like I said I'm a little sceptical of what's been going on too.
But let's wait and see how things develop from here. We don't know the full story yet.
I don't get how that works
@get2sammyb that's true, but unless they actually start showing their games the negativity isn't going away. It feels like an all time low for PlayStation fans right now.
@get2sammyb
In terms of bad communication/ marketing / GaaS - do you think we are still seeing a lot of Jim Ryans influence, with the recent GaaS game cancellations being a side effect of Hulst trying to 'right the ship' - im not saying your wrong, just interested as I dont seem to be able to keep up on who said/did what!
I am still a bit sceptical of Hulst though - the marketing of Pro was under his watch, and whilst I like the Pro itself a lot, the communication/ marketing (or lack of, including specs until after launch!) was truly dire. Cerny seemed completely wasted prior to launch, something which was the complete opposite at PS5 launch.
yet another L for Hermen Hulst. the only good thing he's seemingly done as CEO is cancel all those awful live service games
@get2sammyb "To be fair, through the history of time, games have always ended up getting cancelled."
Sure, but when a entire batch of GaS games get cancelled, some of which are attached to big IPs, it does make you question leadership.
If I burn one or two pancakes... so what. If I serve an entire plate of charcoal I probably wouldn't get a soft demotion.
Good. Now move the HQ, back to Japan.
Less California influences, is better for Playstation.
This is largely a symbolic move, and one I'd guess is mutual between Sony and Hulst.
CEOs don't make every single decision within a company, they actually make very few, normally only the very high "critical" ones. CEOs lay out plans for the direction they want the company to go. It's the VPs and Directors that are tasked with getting the company to their targets.
In stepping down (or being removed) as Co-CEO, all that's happened for Hulst is he's no longer able to decide the overall direction and he's no longer seen as "the face" of PlayStation. As head of internal studios, he'll still have the power to greenlight initiatives, cancel games, open/close/buy developers. Just now he doesn't have the public focus on him as a CEO.
how is the company in good health? they lost billions of dollars on unfulfilled GaaS projects that will destroy their upcoming earnings reports. once they disclose their losses, their stock will tank. i can see it dropping by up to 15% within the next few years.
The shareholders shows how they didn't like Hermen lol. And they probably the same as me who thinks it's about time a Japanese lead SIE again.
The players don't like him. Now the shareholders don't like him either. He had his chance and bet it all big on live service. It was a gamble I'm sure he was aware, turns out he bet red and it came up black. This man lost the company an ungodly amount of money.
Whether he is a net benefit or liability for the company over his entire career is a question for the philosophers. I'm surprised he wasn't let go. And by let go, I mean given a golden parachute to comfortably land a CEO spot at some mid tier tech company, Don Matrick style.
CEOs are by their nature bold decision makers and risk takers (and frequently display psychopathic tendencies, but I digress). It turns out the risk always materializes over a long enough timeline.
With this decision I feel the Jim Ryan era of PlayStation, which I disliked for so many different reasons, is finally well and truly over.
Again the usual #MAKEPLAYSTATIONJAPANESEAGAIN!!!!
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