As part as their latest strategy, Sony pushes into new businesses. The company announced that they will create a new drone joint venture. Sony's mobile division made a partnership with ZMS, a robotics company, in order to launch a new company offering drone-based services to business customers.
The new company is called Aerosense and it will use drones to capture data and images for business customers. Sony Mobile, the company's mobile devices division, will launch the drone company Aerosense in collaboration with ZMP, a Japan-based robotics company. The two companies announced their joint venture on Wednesday.
Aerosense will use unmanned aerial vehicles to offer in the areas of measuring, inspecting, observing, and surveying. The drone company will sell only drone services but not the drones themselves, according to a Sony spokesman statement on The Wall Street Journal. Aerosense will start its activity next year, in 2016. Its potential customers are companies in industries ranging from land surveying to telecommunications.
Sony isn't the only IT company looking for a share in the drone business. Recently, both Google and Amazon made clear their plans to use of drones for package deliver. A few other companies, such Skycatch and Airware, already offer drone-based services to businesses. Sony's joint venture reflects this general trend, as the company struggle to keep up-to-date in a rapidly changing tech landscape.
Kazuo Hira, Sony CEO, has declared earlier this year that the company will focus in four areas: Sony Music, Sony Pictures, the PlayStation gaming division, and its devices business.
Hira expects this strategy to pay off by March 2018, generating an operating profit of about $4.2 billion. Sony Mobile, meanwhile, has become a source of losses for the company. Sony has fallen far behind on emerging markets like China, where Apple, Samsung, and China-based handset makers are dominating the mobile space.
On Wednesday, Sony spokesperson declared that the company's mobile division will focus now on new initiatives for business creation, especially in the Internet of Things sector. The Internet of Things will use sensors to connect just about anything to the Internet, from wereables to refrigerators. Sony explained that the new drone deal is part of this push and it will leverage its sensor, camera, and telecommunications.
Since neither ZMP nor Sony Mobile has any previous experience in the drones sector, the risks for their joint venture may be high. ZMP is a Japanese company which designs driverless car tech and other robotics technology. Until now their robotics tech were limited to the ground. But it might be the right time now for Sony and ZMP to take flight together. Time will tell.
