Sony is starting talks with TCL about creating a joint venture that will manage Sony’s television business and part of its home audio business in the future. The agreement was initially formalized as a memorandum, but the main thing is already clear: TCL will have a controlling stake in the new structure.
Sony is starting talks with TCL about creating a joint venture that will manage Sony’s television business and part of its home audio business in the future. The agreement was initially formalized as a memorandum, but the main thing is already clear: TCL will have a controlling stake in the new structure.
According to TechRadar, the companies have signed a memorandum of intent to create a joint venture, in which TCL will own 51% of the shares and Sony — 49%. The new company will take over the entire cycle of work with TVs and home audio: from development and design to production, sales, logistics and service.
In a statement, Sony explains that the partnership should combine the strengths of both players: Sony provides proven image and sound technologies, brand and operational experience, and TCL — its own display technologies, industrial capacity, scale and lower cost thanks to a vertical supply chain. At the same time, the companies emphasize that they consider themselves «almost equal partners», despite TCL’s formal majority, and the details of the future operating model are still being agreed.
This is not a final agreement yet: it is only about the intention and framework of cooperation. The parties plan to prepare final agreements by the end of March, after which they will publish clarifications on which product lines and markets will be included in the perimeter of the new business.
As the TV market has become increasingly tighter in recent years due to falling margins and the dominance of Chinese manufacturers, who benefit from scale and cost advantages, more brands are looking to partnership and co-production models to maintain brand recognition and technological advantages while reducing development and supply costs.
dev.ua previously reported that Netflix and Sony Pictures Entertainment have agreed on new terms of cooperation, under which the streaming release of Sony films in many countries will start primarily on Netflix. This expands on the previous model, which only worked in select markets.
