Sony has become a highly vertically integrated media conglomerate through strategic mergers and acquisitions across various industries. This includes film studios like Columbia Pictures and TriStar Pictures, music labels like Columbia Records and RCA, and video game developers like Sony Computer Entertainment. Sony aims to control the entire creative process from content production to distribution on its hardware like televisions, phones, and Blu-ray players. This vertical integration allows Sony to maximize profits at each step of the value chain.

1. Sony and Vertical Integration
• Multinational conglomerate corporation
headquartered in Tokyo, Japan; one of the
world's largest media conglomerates with
revenue of $78.88 billion U.S.
• The company initially developed from a
company building electronic broadcasting and
recording equipment to a one that also built the
‘software’ to play or record onto – including,
along with Phillips, the CD - thus, potentially,
cutting out the middle man and maximising
profits.

2. • Sony’s mergers and takeovers have allowed it to
become a vertically intergrated company
• Key deal: in 1989, Sony acquired Columbia
Pictures Entertainment, the American Film and
television company – it could now make films
with Sony equipment that could be watched in
homes and (in some cases, Sony-owned) cinemas
on Sony hardware. Beyond that, it had acquired
Columbia’s back catalogue to be released on
video and DVD which, in an ideal world, could be
played on Sony hardware.

3. • Sony has since created numerous other film production and
distribution units, such as Sony Pictures Classics for art-
house fare, by forming Columbia TriStar Pictures after
merging Columbia Pictures and TriStar Pictures in 1998
• The Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group has a library of
more than 4,000 films and as of 2004 this unit of Sony
distributes about 22 films a year under its various brands in
67 countries. The group owns studio facilities in the United
States, Hong Kong, Madrid, Mexico, the United
Kingdom, Brazil and Japan. Columbia TriStar also has a
contract to distribute films for independent Revolution
Studios and select films by MGM and United Artists.
• 2005 – a Sony-led consortium acquired the legendary
Hollywood studio Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) in a deal
worth nearly $5 billion. Again, in an ideal world, the back
catalogue releases would be played on Sony equipment.

4. • Profits from its major studio successes allow it to
back smaller, independent films through “niche”
companies like Destination Films, which it
purchased in 2001 and Stage 6 Films, a direct to
video/DVD label created in 2007.
It used to have its own cinema chain in which to
exhibit its products; it has Sony Pictures Home
Entertainment: manufactures and distributes the
Sony film library on Blu-ray Disc (a Sony product)
and DVD. It has its own (or co-owned) film
distribution companies around the world, so it
doesn’t have to look for a distributor abroad

5. • It also owns Sony Music Entertainment, formed by successive
mergers of various other companies, including Columbia
Records, Epic and RCA. Sony completed its acquisition of the
German Bertelsmann Music Group on October 1, 2008. The
company Sony Music Entertainment Inc. became a wholly
owned subsidiary of the Sony Corporation of America.
• Artists signed to Sony can be found on Sony produced
soundtracks of Sony films, like Spider-Man (2002), for example.
If you like Chad Kroeger, you may go out and buy music from his
band Nickleback on Road Runner Records, which is owned by
Sony, or perhaps you enjoyed Aerosmith on the Spider-Man
soundtrack, in which case, you might prefer to buy CDs from
their back catalogue, which is owned by Sony!
• 2010 - Sony continues to branch out and buys the publishing
arm of EMI records

6. • Sony Pictures Digital oversees the digital production
and online entertainment assets of Sony Pictures
Entertainment - consists of Sony Pictures
Imageworks, Sony Pictures Animation, Sony Pictures
Mobile, Sony Pictures Digital Networks and others.
• It is known as the digital website interactive creator
for SPE.
• Sony Pictures Digital designed websites for Sony
Pictures, Screen Gems Network, SoapCity, Sony
Pictures Imageworks, GSN, among others for SPE.
• Again, rather than look for a third party to do the
work, Sony has its own facilities for digital production
and special effects and can promote its product on
company created websites. In fact, it also serves other
companies who pay Sony to do what they can’t – Sony
Pictures Imageworks provides special effects – at a
profit – for non-Sony movies too.

7. • Another branch, Sony Computer Entertainment,
specialises in the production of hardware and
software for ‘video’ and pc games, which often
promote Sony (or Sony-licensed) product, like
Spider-Man.
•
In 2001 Sony joined with the Swedish company
Ericsson to manufacture mobile phones. The stated
reason for this venture is to combine Sony's
consumer electronics expertise with Ericsson's
technological leadership in the communications
sector. They now produce phones on which Sony
movies can be watched, Sony websites can be
accessed, Sony music can be listened to and Sony
games can be played.
• A recent move has seen a Sony deal with the major
cinema chain AMC to install its digital projectors in
all of the company's screens by 2012.