Sony Corporation: Overview, Environment And Analysis

Sony Corporation: Overview, Environment, And Analysis

Overview

Sony Corporation is a Japanese corporation that operates worldwide. It currently is headquartered in Minato, Tokyo and was founded in 1946. Its current CEO is Kenichiro Yoshida. Sony has products in many different industries, including electronics, entertainment, and gaming. The company owns one of the top-tier music providers in the world, is the creator of the most popular video game console in history, one of the largest video game publishing businesses around, and is one of the leading manufacturers of electronic products for the consumer and professional markets. Not only is Sony involved with these industries, but they also are one of the top companies involved with the film industry (Corporate Info 2019). Sony has a long history of CSR activities and continues to be a very community-driven company today.

Environment/ Activities

Sony is well known for its many projects involving the environment. A big mission of Sony is to produce high-quality goods at the most minor expense to the environment. So in September 2010, it set up an online, open, public forum. Members of the forum were asked to discuss ideas about the sustainability challenges that hindered their eco-friendly progress and then innovate Sony technologies to conquer the challenges. The forum was filled with over 400 concepts from the members. From these, a judge panel chose seven of the top ideas, and then cut the list down to three (Simon Beavis for the Guardian Professional Network 2011).

Eventually, the panel picked the winner, GreenBook, a software application using gps and social grouping to bring friends together on volunteering projects (Simon Beavis for the Guardian Professional Network 2011). The project was created by Paul Frigout, who may be known otherwise as Siniuc.

Sony wanted a way to broadcast the need for sustainability to wider group of people. It wanted to reach a new audience and spread the idea of sustainability beyond those who are already actively eco-conscious. Innovative people were its new targets, and it reached them with ease.

Analysis

I think that Sony is brilliant by creating this forum. By doing so, they saved themselves time and resources by having the public create new ideas. Not only did they receive an immense amount of submissions, but they did so for free. It is an all-around win situation for Sony because they improve their image while saving funds.

Sony’s brilliance is really displayed when we recognize the fact that they appealed to the generation they were targeting. In these times, everything is moving fast. Information is no longer popular in newspapers. Magazines are becoming obsolete. The generation that is coming up is all about technology. Therefore, Sony creating an online forum is the easiest way to reach those that care about the future of the environment.

As stated before, all of these submissions were obtained at no cost. Sony offered no incentives and it was ran on a system of good faith. With that being said, imagine if Sony actually offered compensation to those that submitted. Two things would have happened if they did so. One, they would have received many more submissions. Two, the ideas that were given would have been more thought out than something that someone did in good faith