Sony, Sony

These make Sony one of the most comprehensive entertainment companies in the world. Sony's principal business operations include Sony Corporation (Sony Electronics in the U.S.), Sony Pictures Entertainment, Sony Computer Entertainment, Sony BMG Music Entertainment, Sony Ericsson and Sony Financial Holdings.

Morita pushed for a word that does not exist in any language so that they could claim the word "Sony" as their own (which paid off when they successfully sued a candy producer using the name, who claimed that "Sony" was an existing word in some language).

The move was not without opposition: TTK's principal bank at the time, Mitsui, had strong feelings about the name. They pushed for a name such as Sony Electronic Industries, or Sony Teletech. Akio Morita was firm, however, as he did not want the company name tied to any particular industry. Eventually, both Ibuka and Mitsui Bank's chairman gave their approval.

Philips and Sony abandoned their MMCD format and agreed upon Toshiba's SD format with only one modification based on MMCD technology, viz EFMPlus. The unified disc format was called DVD which was marketed in 1997. Sony introduced the MiniDisc format in 1993 as an alternative to Philips DCC or Digital Compact Cassette. Since the introduction of MiniDisc, Sony has attempted to promote its own audio compression technologies under the ATRAC brand, against the more widely used MP3.

In 1994 Sony launched the PlayStation (later PS one ). This successful console was succeeded by the PlayStation 2 in 2000, itself succeeded by the PlayStation 3 in 2006. The PlayStation brand was extended to the portable games market in 2005 by the PlayStation Portable. Sony developed the Universal Media Disc (UMD) optical disc medium for use on the PlayStation Portable.Although Sony tried to push the UMD format for movies, major studios stopped supporting the format in the Spring of 2006.

Sony's decision to replace Idei with the British Howard Stringer marked the first time that a foreigner has run a major Japanese electronics firm. On the same date, Kunitake Ando stepped down as President and was replaced by Ryoji Chubachi.

Sony has said that they have signed on to have about 75 percent of their Sony Building running on geothermal power. The "Sony Take Back Recycling Program" allows consumers to recycle the electronics products that they buy from Sony by taking them to eCycle drop-off points around the U.S. The company has also developed a biobattery that runs on sugars and carbohydrates that works similarly to the way living creatures work. This is the most powerful small biobattery to date Sony develops Worlds Most Powerful Sugar-based Bio Battery Prototype.

This document involved the company's surveillance of environmental activists in an attempt to plan how to counter their movements. This document specifically mentioned environmental groups that were trying to pass laws that held electronics-producing companies responsible for the clean up of the toxic chemicals contained in their merchandise Sony's PR War on Activists . In early July of 2007, Sony ranked 14th on the Greenpeace chart "Guide to Greener Electronics." This chart graded major electronics companies on their environmental work. Sony fell from its earlier 11th place ranking due to Greenpeace's claims that Sony had double standards in their waste policies Sony hits bottom of Greenpeace eco rankings.

Source: Wikipedia > Sony