PS4 sales look strong, but Sony expects to make another loss next year

Sony CEO Kaz Hirai has put on his bravest face to report the company's annual financials, announcing a $1.26 billion overall loss despite a sales increase of 14.3 percent. In all, Sony corporation made $76 billion from sales.

The results were as expected, and Sony is weathering the storm right now--it's in a period of transition, having sold off its Vaio laptop division and giving its TV people their own department.

All that work is still ongoing, too, and Sony has already warned its investors that it expects another net loss of $490m over the next 12 months. I imagine there's a lot of people with a lot of money hoping that will be the end of all the sad times as Sony, with the executive team forgoing their bonuses for the year.

But things are certainly looking strong for the PlayStation team. All in all, sales across the gaming division were up 38.5 percent, raking in a whopping $9.5 billion for the company. All that money couldn't help the gaming division shake off an operating loss of $79 million, however, which the company attributed to both the cost of launching the PlayStation 4, as well as a $60 million write-off PC titles from Sony Online Entertainment.

Sony lumps hardware sales together in its financial reports, saying that the company shifted 14.6 million PS4's and PS3's over the last year. That's slightly down from the 16.5 million it recorded for its 2012 financial year, though back then Sony included the PlayStation 2 in the figure. Sony expects to sell a total of 17 million consoles over the next 12 months.

Portable consoles aren't doing so well, however. The Vita, Vita TV, and PSP dropped for 4.1 million overall sales this year, and that figure is expected to decline to 3.5 million sales over the next 12 months.

Software sales--the real prize for Sony, which makes a tidy profit from selling games--increased to 374 million for the year, up from 266 million the year before.

Looking forward, Kaz Hirai will reveal more about the Sony corporation's long-term strategies on May 22. Its gaming division will also have a big show planned for E3 2014, of course.