http://www.theverge.com/2015/2/19/8068607/sony-should-focus-on-ps4
This is a really interesting article and a great read.
Quote
It's funny how times change. Twenty years ago, the PlayStation was a skunkworks product that a renegade faction within Sony had just fought to get released. Now here we are in 2015, and Sony CEO Kaz Hirai -- a former boss of the PlayStation division -- has announced that the company is essentially going to stop trying to grow its consumer electronics businesses beside the PlayStation 4. The PlayStation isn't only Sony's last great product; it might as well be Sony's only product.
Sony is The PlayStation Company.
Sony has always been the crown jewel of Japan's once-dominant technology industry. The company made beautifully designed, highly profitable devices in just about every category imaginable and imagined a few categories of its own. But the one invention with the potential to unify the company -- the internet -- proved to be its undoing. Sony botched the shift to digital music, it missed the move to smartphones and tablets, and has consistently failed to create a compelling ecosystem for its products. Now the smartphone -- other companies' smartphones, usually -- has replaced almost everything it sells.
...
PlayStation is different. To be clear, the PS4 is the only truly compelling product that Sony sells today. That's not to say it's the only good product -- almost everything the company makes is at least fit for purpose. But the PS4 is the only Sony product with genuine differentiation. Everything about its launch was textbook; Sony created a sleek, powerful, affordable console and targeted it right at the heart of a clear demographic while Microsoft sank its own credibility with boneheaded decision after decision.
Today, the PlayStation brand stands for the cool, futuristic gaming experience as much as it ever did in the '90s. The PS4 isn't a do-everything box -- it is simply ruthlessly efficient at what it is intended to do, offering unbeatable performance and design for the price. The Xbox One will continue to do fine in North America, but Sony is right back at the forefront of the colossal video games industry.
This is a really interesting article and a great read.