Sony Gets Things
“What enables Idei to think that such a thing can be done is Sony’s breadth. It is the only company with premium positions in both the gizmo world and the media world. At AOL Time Warner, synergy is an epithet, but in Tokyo the promise not only survives, but thrives. To Idei, everything comes together with his beloved buzzword: broadband. Sony will create not only network-connected products but also devise services that deliver the content—much of which Sony owns through its own music, movie and game divisions. (The early models for this include the wildly popular online game called EverQuest and an interactive television guide.) Sony may even have a hand in new forms of currency used to purchase such services: through its own bank, the company offers Tokyo train commuters a smart-card payment system.”