Sony Group Corporation (NYSE:SONY) Q1 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Unidentified Company Representative: Thank you for the question, as I said, there’s maybe reaction after the COVID-19 pandemic. Let us say at one time, demand was down. That’s a fact. So people now have the pent-up demand. So last year, already — that the people already bought lots of cameras after that. So the strength of demand is still persistent, which is a great pleasure. We have a continuing demand. From a macroscopic standpoint that the traveling demand is going up, people spend more money on traveling, vacations and so on, I suppose. So that might have a good impact on that demand.

Unidentified Company Representative: So we’d like to move on to the next question. [Operator Instructions]. [Indiscernible], who is a freelancer, please go ahead.

Unidentified Analyst: Can you hear me?

Unidentified Company Representative: Yes, I can hear you, please.

Unidentified Analyst: I have two questions, and the first point is about game business. The third party, the application has increased. How do you assess this? Do you think that this trend will be here to stay? Or do you think that you need more efforts to promote this? And so that is related to that. In your document, PlayStation Plus, the number of user, there is a change in the disclosure conditions. So is there any reason for that? And secondly, about Pictures, particularly for drama, the streaming service overseas, is there any other impact of the fluctuation of the overseas market in this area?

Unidentified Company Representative: Thank you very much for your question. The Game & Network Service that you are talking about, the increase of third-party titles, and I think your question is about our assessment on that. And during the first quarter, the new title from the third party, we have a very strong ones. And so in a software, the overall year-on-year, there has been increased revenue from this. So of course, on our part, the strong titles, the third-party titles should continue to prosper. And as a platform, we are very happy about it. And first-party titles and our new titles, because of the release timing, there has been the reduced sales year-on-year. But not only the third-party titles, but we would like to make greater efforts for the first-party titles.

And your second question is about PS Plus and the change of the assumption about disclosure conditions. And about PS Plus, we just ceased to announce a review and the disclosure. And also, there has been some expansion of disclosures. So Matsuoka-san will cover this point.

Naomi Matsuoka: And FY ’22 in June, there was renewal. And after that, the PS Plus, in addition to the greater number of the subscribers moved to the more attractive titles with the increase in app. So we have been expanding the PS Plus business. So extra and premium, we would like to continue to promote the shift. In order — and in order to do so, we would like to increase the service appeal. And on this basis, we are able to confirm the growth through network services expansion. And so we stopped the disclosing, the number of subscribers as a result. And what are included in others? That is software sales other than PS Plus. They will be newly released. So in this area, the multi-platform will be covered, including PC. So we would like to promote this. So with additional disclosure, I hope that we can give an update about our progress.