Sony Computer Entertainment chairman and chief executive Ken Kutaragi was slammed with more criticism today, this time from Sony CEO Sir Howard Stringer himself. This comes just three months after an article in Newsweek berated the executive for his "slowness" in securing PS3 exclusives, which it claims cost Sony PS3-only games including GTA IV, and the highly anticipated Assassin's Creed.
In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, it states that the "uncommunicative" Kutaragi was moved in a recent Sony reshuffle because Stringer found him difficult to work with.
The article also states that Kutaragi would frequently make decisions without informing chief exec Stringer, and not tell him about problems in the production process. One example alleged that Kutaragi had allowed the PS3 to go over budget on development costs without clearing it with upper management first.
He also advised for cutting the price of the 20GB console by 20 percent in Japan, a decision which Stringer said he agreed to in a hope it would ensure the console's success, but now admits, "Financially it wasn't one of my best moments."
Stringer told the newspaper that in an attempt to patch up relations between the two, he has tried hard to win Kutaragi's trust, to no avail: "I've had dinner with [Mr. Kutaragi] more times than I've had dinner with my wife, and that's not really healthy," he said.
In December, Stringer moved Kutaragi's role away from the day-to-day control of the games division, and instead he is now focused on the next-gen games side of the business, the article concluded. SCE day-to-day operations are overseen by president Kaz Hirai, former head of Sony Computer Entertainment America.
nawras, you have to understand the japanese business mentality. A westerner running the company would obviously create a divide with certain japanese businessmen who believe in japanese only control. We saw this back when Nintendo was actually boycotted in Japan and lost a lot of exclusives as well as business, because Nintendo canceled their contract with sony for a CD based console in favor of working with Phillips, which was a UK based company. The result was the Playstation which had all the old third party exclusives nintendo used to have. Same thing happened here in a sense.
Typical of a corp to just blame someone for a particular failure. If Sony keeps up with this I don't know where they will be heading
This explains quite a bit actually. Too bad developers and gamers are going to suffer for 4 years because of it.
"samad5: A lot of musical chairs going on at Sony. I wonder who will have the last laugh. " Microsoft...?
'oh noes!!! Sony have now just employed a Giant Enemy Crab!!' 'Quick, make it work with Kutaragi for Massive Damage!!!one!!!!!1111!!!eleven1!!!!!!!!!'
It is sad Kutaragi has lost some of his touch. But I am more amped about the European release of PS3. Can't wait to play Motorstorm and Resistance: FoM ;)
This is Old News.....anything new gamespot??
Well....I hate Sony with every bone in my body, but I'll admit I have alot of respect for Stringer. At least this guy can admit his companies' bluders unlike Kutaragi : "there are no ps3 overheating problems"...[ps3 being hosed down with a fire extinguisher in the background]. Well, it looks like kharma finally reached Mr. Kutaragi after all, it was this guy who wanted to topple NIntendo out of revenge, and he did succeed....for a few years at least. Ps3 is not as earth shattering as ppl are claiming it to be and now it seems that Nintendo is turning itself around this generation in such a huge way that I don't think anybody (including myself) expected it to.
These screw ups is just a gain for nintendo and microsoft. Keep it coming sony. I not mad at you. The more sony mess up, the more my xbox360 looks better.
yeeooow! cant wait for gta4 and assasins creed to come out on 360.
SONY HAvE sELL ALL PRE_BUYS! ON FINLAND O´VER 10000
Fire kutagari. Atleast Sir howard is man enough to admit to his own faults.
A lot of musical chairs going on at Sony. I wonder who will have the last laugh.
its funny ......if hes the father of PS3, he can do whatever he wants!!
I just hope PS3 price drops by the time Final Fantasy and Metal Gear Solid are released. Any other news are just pointless and attempts at gaining more publicity. Same goes for Apple's Iphone. What's its target price at the moment? Like $499? Damn expensive for a cell phone.
Is Kutaragi THIS bad? Hmmm...
"That said, Sony is a joke right now. I for one am glad to see the clowns revealing themselves, because many of us in the informed catagory of gamers have been watching their blunders for the last TWO YEARS, wondering when it would become obvious to everyone else out there." and then the people in the "even more informed" catagory of gamers know of mistakes all three console makers have made for even longer than the past 2 years and are starting to do even now (for example, while the media is jumping on the Wii bandwagon in droves, some "even more informed people" have noted that Nintendo's already letting success get to their head and are started to repeat some of the dev relation mistakes that cost them in the N64 and GC generations). and the "even more informed" catagory of gamers has been wondering when that becomes obvious to the "informed" catagory of gamers. of course the smartest ones of all are the "blissfully apathic" catagory of gamers
lol, i always love the playstaion and sony but kutaragi is just plain funny to watch. Kaz is ok though but that embarrising "Riiiiiiidge raceer"! video was hilarious
O-double-N-E-Deeeeeeeeee.....
Dirk13 "yeah that's genius howard, you dont trust him, primarily because of his messups on going overbudget and overtime on the PS3's development.......and so where do you put him? on the NEXT GEN hardware development? if you're still around for the next generation it seems like you want the exact same thing to happen, or even worse? maybe Stringer should reshuffle himself." We are so far removed from their next system, that all he can do right now is R&D with that. No final decisions are made until about a year before the hardware is released, so if he is over in that position he isn't making decisions that will actually affect their next system. That said, Sony is a joke right now. I for one am glad to see the clowns revealing themselves, because many of us in the informed catagory of gamers have been watching their blunders for the last TWO YEARS, wondering when it would become obvious to everyone else out there.
What sony needs is a Reggie like guy to come in and show everyone that they arent playing around anymore, that theyre going to get serious and all the old blood is out of the company, many consumers dont trust them anymore so massive changes need to be made
the man is insane
sony lost it´s moyo =P
where's Reggie?
You know, Kutaragi may have been moved out of direct control of what happens to the PS3, but Kaz Hirai isn't any better, and he's been moved in to take control of what Kutaragi just lost. Sony needs some fresh blood and a new take for their (now current gen) system. There's bound to be a good soul out there capable of repairing the damage the Sony PR machine has done to its Playstation brand.
Dirk13 says "yeah that's genius howard, you dont trust him, primarily because of his messups on going overbudget and overtime on the PS3's development.......and so where do you put him? on the NEXT GEN hardware development? if you're still around for the next generation it seems like you want the exact same thing to happen, or even worse?" i dont mean to be rude Dirk but i it says next gen games so now he's over seeing software dev and such but yeah that doesnt seem that much better now that you mention it.
yeah that's genius howard, you dont trust him, primarily because of his messups on going overbudget and overtime on the PS3's development.......and so where do you put him? on the NEXT GEN hardware development? if you're still around for the next generation it seems like you want the exact same thing to happen, or even worse? maybe Stringer should reshuffle himself.
Time to clean house in at the Sony gaming division I think.
Kutaragi got to get his act together or he might doom sony
The PS3 is great, but Kutaragi is as smug as any exec........... I'M LOOKING AT YOU MOORE!!! THAT GTA4 TATOO IS LAAAAAAAAAAAME!!!
I think sony should just drop his ass for good, instead of sliding him around in the company.
Kutaragi been owned!
[This message was deleted at the request of the original poster]
Sony likes to Point fingers amongs themselves too huh... Not only have they been stealing ideas from their competitors, but now they are blaming eachother in the industry.... Hmmm I sence a distrunbence in the force...
Man, the hits keep coming for Sony...Seems like every time I read gaming news, Sony's getting some sort of negative press. I swear, should I ever read good news for Sony, I'll probably think its a misprint. -=x
Wow! This does not sound good for Sony...I actually feel bad for them now. That Carazzzzzy Kutaragi!
they are admitting their own mistakes, this is actually a first. now if they are as agressive, this ps3 purchase will be even better
Of course it's not bad news, it's very good news: thanks to this, GTA IV and Assassins Creed are heading the Xbox 360.
Is it me or did gamespot make the avatars bigger for the biggest flamers? Oops!
I don't see this as much of a bad news...A rep finally did come clean and is just showingg that he wants to keep Sony in the game. From what it appears, Ken got what he got for his actions. Hopefully, there'll be better management and they will show 3rd party developers better attention for good exclusives. They lost a number of highly anticipated games that look awesome. We'll see how they do with the remaining exclusives. btw, blueflamedino...nintendo and microsoft weren't the best last gen. Especially the gamecube (I was really dissappointed, just saying)...but they've really thought it out and MS is on the money with decisions in the last year.
You know what? Even though this is just more bad news ... this is the first time a Sony representative has come clean with us. After all the pathetic lies and BS coming from Sony since the Killzone 2 Magic show at E3 2005, this is the first thread of honesty to come out of the Sony camp for a long time. They've made the 1st step to return our faith.
Yeah, all this bad news for Sony warms my heart. It's fun to observe an actual console war without a clear winner.
I really enjoy hearing bad sony press. Serves them right for being so arrogant
Sigh...yet more bad news from Sony. I WAS a huge Sony fan...WAS... As of late it just seems NOT worth to buy one. Lack of great games, exclusives, price is ridiculous, and the blu-ray?!?! I work in Home Theater @ Best Buy and buying the Blu-Ray built into the ps3 rather than a stand alone blu-ray player is a 20% picture difference in quality. Who gives a damn about the built in blu-ray. Small selection of the movies and hardly anyone OWNS a 1080p tv. Question is....WTF HAPPENED TO SONY?!?! The PS3 was supposed to be the **** yet Xbox360 and Wii are killing them.
Sony is really going downhill. They really aren't doing so well. But we don't have to worry about them going the way of Sega.. They make a lot of money from other electronics..
better management maybe needed, especially when a mighty empire loses to a company that was struggling desparately in the last gen
Kutaragi has a legacy of not telling upper management what he is doing and it should take people by no suprise. He developed the SPC700 Sound Chip for the SNES without telling management and almost got fired. His job was saved because it was a success and made the company good profit.
well look on the bright side at least The PS3's are going to have the rumble back on the controllers:p. Maybe things are starting to look up for Sony.
This is the best news PS3 related I've heard so far. One of my biggest problems with Sony as of late was their attitude.. the fact they're admitting mistakes and pointing out some of these things helps me gain some respect back for them.
GS always reports Sony's bad news ASAP, but when it comes to the good news they take their time...real nice...of course I'm kind of happy Ken got moved around he's sort of lost his touch and Sony won't go down they're too big and with all the news from last week (immersion) (PSH) (Update) (GDC) Sony will start to gain momentum especially with the Euro launch not too far away.