UPDATE, writethru: With a major assist from the phenomenal global box office performance of Spider-Man: No Way Home, Sony Pictures Entertainment has recorded a third-quarter profit of $1.314 billion, up a staggering 570% from the comparable period in 2020. Revenues saw a 122% increase to $4.063 billion versus the same quarter the previous year.
Reporting results for the three months ended December 31, 2021 out of Tokyo this afternoon local time, Sony said other contributing factors to the strong quarter included the performance of Venom: Let There Be Carnage as well as higher sales for television productions due to the licensing of Seinfeld and better sales for media networks resulting from the acquisition of Crunchyroll.
Through December, the Jon Watts-direcgted Spider-Man: No Way Home had grossed $1.282 billion worldwide. Through last Sunday it was at $1.74 billion global, having also become only the 10th movie ever to exceed $1 billion at the international box office.
Movies on deck during the fourth quarter at Sony include this month’s Tom Holland-starrer Uncharted. Following that, Morbius is due out in April with the Brad Pitt-fronted Bullet Train in July and the animated Spider-Man: Across The Spider-Verse (Part One) in October.
The Pictures division is now forecast to reach 205 billion yen ($1.8 billion) for the full-year, a 90% increase from October’s prediction.
There was fluctuation in the Games and Network Services segment with sales down but operating income increasing to 92.9 billion yen ($810.5 million). There has been strong demand for the PlayStation 5 console, but the company has faced difficulty in meeting that demand owing to a shortage of semiconductors. On an earnings call, Sony said recovery had not come as soon as expected in that area. However, the corporation raised its full-year profit forecast for the division to 345 trillion yen ($3 billion).
Sony Interactive Entertainment said earlier this week that it has agreed to buy Bungie, an independent videogame developer and longtime Sony partner behind the Halo and Destiny franchises, for $3.6 billion.
Sony Corp revenues overall hit 3.03 trillion yen ($26.4 billion), while operating profit was 465.2 billion yen ($4.05 billion), a 32% increase and well above analyst estimates. The group increased its full-year operating income outlook by 15% to a record 1.2 trillion yen ($10.6 billion).
