It has been a long time coming but Sony Mobile will be leaving South Africa. According to the Xperia Blog, Sony has begun “defocusing” its mobile business by changing its focus regions across the globe.
Sony Mobile will be exiting a couple of countries over the next few months including Australia, Canada, South America, Mexico, Africa, the Middle East and more. The company will begin a heavy push on its most popular territories including Japan, Europe, Taiwan and Hong Kong.
This is the first confirmation of the exit after much speculation that the brand has not been doing too well. Sony smartphones have been taking the backseat when it comes to the latest innovation and with Samsung, Apple and Huawei owning the market in SA, Sony has been struggling to find a spot to fit in.
It will be harder to get hold of Xperia devices and even harder to get support for them in the coming years now that the exit has been confirmed. This is not the first time Sony has exited South Africa. A couple of years ago, the Sony Displays division pulled and ever since then, you cannot purchase any Sony TVs in the country.
Sony reported an operating loss of $879,45 million in their mobile division according to Reuters. The company ships around 6.5 million handsets annually compared to Samsung at 291 million. It seems they are determined to keep going but only in certain parts of the world.
We have reached out Sony mobile’s PR to get feedback on the situation and how it will affect SA consumers. More on this as it develops.
Are you a Sony phone owner? What do you make of this news? Let us know down below.
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