Media, Entertainment and Gaming
Nintendo Co's group profit surged to Ñ132.42 billion ($1.1 billion) in its fiscal first half from Ñ54.3 billion a year earlier. The company said group sales increased to Ñ694.8 billion from Ñ298.8 billion, with 78% of sales booked overseas. Following the strong performance, Nintendo said it has upped its profit forecast for the year through March to Ñ275 billion ($2.4 billion) from the Ñ245 billion it predicted in July. The company projects 10% sales growth to Ñ1.5 trillion.
Internet
Softbank Corp plans spend about Ñ40 billion ($350.3 million) on its operations at a new data center in Southwestern Japan next year, according to media sources. The data centre in Fukuoka Prefecture is expected to carry more than 100,000 computer servers in an area of 140,000 square metres. Softbank is focusing its operations on Internet-based companies that typically operate server networks of several thousand units.
Yahoo Japan Corp. reported a 9.2% rise in its group net profit in the April-September fiscal first half to Ñ29.2 billion ($255.7 million) from a year earlier. The Internet service provider said its sales registered a 17.2% climb to Ñ117.7 billion and its advertisement division went up 27% to Ñ54 billion.
Mobile/Wireless
NTT DoCoMo has plans to form a joint venture with UFIDA in a bid to tap China's 3G market, according to media sources. In February this year, the two companies announced plans to set up a joint venture to develop an enterprise mobile service platform and applications. The JV, which industry sources say is called Yong You Da Kang, has a total investment of $13.4 million, with NTT DoCoMo holdiong one third. According to UFIDA, the company is the largest local management software supplier in the Asia-Pacific and ChinaÆs largest supplier of management software, ERP software, financial software, group management software, human resource management software and SMB management software.
Hardware
Sony Corp. reported a rise in net profit to Ñ73.7 billion ($645.4 million) in the three months to September from Ñ1.7 billion ($14.9 million) a year earlier. The company said its revenue registered 12.3% growth to Ñ2 trillion. Sony ascribed the improvement to the surge in sales of digital cameras and laptop computers, which helped offset heavy losses from the PlayStation 3. The company also said it had swung to an operating profit of Ñ90.5 billion from a year earlier loss of Ñ20.8 billion even though losses at its game division more than doubled to Ñ96.7 billion. Sony upgraded its full-year outlook to a 527% rise in operating profit to Ñ450 billion, versus its previous target of Ñ440 billion.
Hitachi will discontinue development and production of home-use PCs because of intense competition and declining sales. The company said it has not developed PC models for the year-end shopping season and it has no plans to develop any future models at the moment. Hitachi was one of the pioneers of PC development in Japan.
¬ Haymarket Media Limited. All rights reserved.
