Sony

Sony Group Corporation is a Japanese company headquartered in Tokyo that operates electronics, image sensor, video game, film and television, and music businesses. For its fiscal year ended March 31, 2026, it reported sales of 12.48 trillion yen, according to its annual report on Form 20-F filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). It was established in 1946 and is one of Japan’s best-known multinational companies.

History of Sony

Sony was founded in May 1946 as Tokyo Tsushin Kogyo, which means Tokyo Telecommunications Engineering Corporation. Its founders were Masaru Ibuka and Akio Morita. In the weak economy of postwar Japan, they earned a living by repairing radios and making small numbers of voltmeters while looking for new electronics to design.

The Science Museum Group notes that their first electronic product was an automatic rice cooker, which had limited success. The founders wanted a name that could work across languages as they expanded into the United States and Europe, and because the initials of the company’s original name were already in use by another firm, they created the name Sony.

The company changed its name to Sony Kabushiki Kaisha, or Sony Corporation in English, in January 1958. It listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange in December 1958, and began trading in the United States through American depositary receipts in June 1961. These are certificates that let U.S. investors hold shares of a foreign company. It was listed on the New York Stock Exchange in September 1970.

Sony expanded into entertainment during the 1960s and 1980s. It created the CBS/Sony Records joint venture in 1968, and in January 1988 it acquired CBS Records, the music division of the U.S. broadcaster CBS. That business became Sony Music Entertainment. In April 2021 the parent company changed its name to Sony Group Corporation to reflect its role as headquarters of a group of businesses.

In 1979 Sony set up a financial business as a 50-50 joint venture with the U.S. insurer Prudential, which later became Sony Life Insurance and a wholly owned subsidiary in 1996. That business explains why Sony long had a financial services arm alongside its entertainment and electronics segments.

Products and services of Sony

Sony’s annual report describes five reportable segments: Entertainment, Technology and Services (ET&S), Imaging and Sensing Solutions (I&SS), Game and Network Services (G&NS), Pictures and Music. A reportable segment is a part of a company whose results are reported separately.

The ET&S segment covers consumer electronics such as televisions, audio products and cameras. The I&SS segment makes image sensors, the semiconductor devices that capture light in cameras and phones. The G&NS segment runs the PlayStation game platform and its online services.

The Pictures segment produces and distributes films and television programs, and the Music segment includes recorded music and music publishing. Sony says its game business depends on the success of gaming platforms and on software from outside developers. Sales of its electronics and games are especially sensitive to demand during the year-end holiday season.

Corporate structure and operations

Sony Group Corporation is incorporated in Japan. Its registered office is at 7-1 Konan 1-chome, Minato-ku, Tokyo. The group holds a 50 percent stake in Sony Honda Mobility, a joint venture with Honda.

For the fiscal year ended March 31, 2026, sales were 12 trillion 479.6 billion yen, an increase of 444.7 billion yen from the previous year. The company said the increase came mainly from the I&SS and Music segments. Cost of sales was 8.64 trillion yen, or 69.2 percent of sales, an improvement from 70.7 percent a year earlier.

Research and development costs were 762.0 billion yen, or 6.1 percent of sales, up 27.4 billion yen. Selling, general and administrative expenses were 2.30 trillion yen, or 18.4 percent of sales.

As of March 31, 2026, Sony had approximately 94,900 employees. That is about 17,400 fewer than a year earlier, mainly because it no longer consolidated the financial services business after a partial spin-off, and because of headcount reductions in ET&S in Japan and business divestitures in I&SS outside Japan. About 8 percent of employees belonged to labor unions.

The annual report describes a policy of considering how its business activities affect stakeholders, including shareholders, customers, employees, suppliers, business partners and local communities, as well as the global environment, and says Sony focuses on building trust through dialogue.

Impact of Sony

Sony has influenced several industries at once. Its image sensors are used in cameras and phones, its PlayStation platform is one of the main video game systems, and its film and music divisions own large libraries of entertainment content. Few companies combine hardware, components and content in the same group.

The company’s early decision to build a global brand rather than a Japanese one helped it enter overseas markets. Its purchase of CBS Records also showed the strategy of owning content as well as the devices on which people consume it.

Sony’s structure continues to change. The 2025 partial spin-off of its financial business moved Sony toward a group centered on technology and entertainment. The company says it also wants to reduce its environmental impact, with a goal of net-zero emissions across its value chain by 2040.

Challenges and criticism

The annual report records several setbacks. In fiscal 2025, which ended in March 2026, Sony recognized impairment losses on the non-financial assets of Bungie, the maker of the game Destiny, and Pixomondo, a visual effects company. An impairment loss is an accounting charge that recognizes an asset is worth less than previously recorded.

The company also carried out structural reforms in its electronics segment in Japan, which reduced headcount. It warns that producing and procuring parts in China and other Asian countries can lengthen the time needed to supply products to other markets, and that planning operations in some countries can be difficult.

Editorially reviewed by Specialty Digest Editorial TeamLast reviewed November 4, 2026Researched and drafted with AI assistanceReport an issue