Thank you very much for taking time to join us today. We will now begin the Sony Group Corporation fiscal year 2026 second quarter earnings announcement. I am Ishii from Corporate Communications. I will be acting as moderator. Thank you. First, Ms. Lin Tao, Executive Officer and CFO, will present the second quarter results and fiscal year 2026 forecast, followed by question-and-answer session. Please note that to ensure our international audience can hear the speaker's own words, the presentation via the English feed will be delivered in a pre-recorded video. The session is expected to last approximately 70 minutes. Ms. Tao, please.
Hello, I am Lin Tao, CFO of Sony Group Corporation. Welcome to Q2 earning announcement. Consolidated sales for the second quarter ended September 30th, 2026, increased 10% compared to the same quarter of the previous fiscal year to JPY 3,429.4 billion , and consolidated operating income increased 45% to JPY 622.3 billion. Both were record highs for the second quarter.
Net income increased 44% to JPY 449.6 billion. The financial results by segment are shown in the Q2 FY 2026 results by segment slide. In the all other segment, we recorded an additional loss of approximately JPY 30 billion related to Sony Honda Mobility during the quarter. This substantially completed the recognition of losses associated with the downsizing of the company's operations.
We have increased our FY 2026 sales forecast 4% compared to our previous forecast to JPY 13 trillion, our operating income forecast 9% to JPY 1,870 billion , and our net income forecast 10% to JPY 1,330 billion . The forecast for operating cash flow is now JPY 1 , 600 billion. The impact of U.S. tariff refunds and memory market conditions on the full-year operating income forecast remains largely unchanged.
The forecast by segment is shown in FY 2026 results forecast by segment slide. I will now give an overview of each business. First is G&NS segment. FY 2026 Q2 sales increased 9% year-on-year to JPY 1 , 208.5 billion. Operating income increased 83% to JPY 220.1 billion, a record high for the second quarter. Excluding one-time losses of JPY 49.8 billion recorded in the same quarter of the previous fiscal year, operating income increased 29%.
For the full fiscal year, we have increased the sales forecast 6% compared to the previous forecast to JPY 4 , 830 billion. We have increased the operating income forecast 6% compared to the previous forecast to JPY 700 billion, primarily due to the impact of higher third-party software and network service sales and decreased costs. The number of monthly active user across the PlayStation platform in September increased 7% compared to the same month of the previous fiscal year to 127 million accounts. That was a record high for September.
Total playtime for the quarter increased 4% year-on-year. The year-on-year trend for both metrics improved significantly compared to the first quarter of this fiscal year, which we believe demonstrates that the baseline of engagement is steadily improving. With regard to PS5 hardware, we have been able to offset the rise in memory prices through adjustments to promotions and pricing, as well as additional cost reduction, and we expect hardware profitability for the current fiscal year to remain on par with the previous fiscal year.
Regarding memory procurement for next fiscal year, based on discussions held so far with various suppliers, we have aligned on the quantity of memory needed for our projected hardware unit sales. Regarding first-party titles, cumulative sales of Marvel's Wolverine, released in September, exceeded 2.4 million units, contributing to the improved results of the entire segment for the quarter. We leveraged our expertise building the Marvel's Spider-Man franchise to create a differentiated action game experience for Marvel's Wolverine. Users have praised the new title for its highly immersive action, high-quality production, and richly layered storytelling.
We have decided to postpone the release of God of War Laufey to the first quarter of next fiscal year. We will continue to develop the game to ensure that it provides a premium experience that meets the expectation of the title's diverse fan base. Although new PS5 unit sales are gradually declining as expected in this stage of the console life cycle, the PS platform continues to expand and grow in a stable manner.
Looking ahead to next fiscal year, we aim to continue to enhance user engagement and further strengthen monetization through the release of strong titles and the expansion of our service. We also intend to make solid progress in preparing for the next-generation platform. Next is the music segment. FY 2026 Q2 sales increased 10% year-on-year to JPY 598.4 billion.
Operating income increased 6% to JPY 122.8 billion, setting a record high profit for the second quarter. This was primarily due to an increase in music streaming revenue, despite the absence of the hit theatrical release of "Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba," which was recorded in the same quarter of the previous fiscal year. For the full fiscal year, we have increased our sales forecast 5% compared to the previous forecast to JPY 2 , 300 billion, and our operating income forecast 6% from the previous forecast to JPY 445 billion.
Streaming revenue for the quarter on U.S. dollar basis increased 7% year-on-year in recorded music and 6% in music publishing. The single "Choosin' Texas" by Ella Langley is a huge hit, exceeding 1.8 billion cumulative streams globally and breaking multiple records on the music charts. The song has spent a total of 26 weeks at number one on the U.S. Billboard singles chart, breaking the record previously held by a Mariah Carey song released approximately 30 years ago. It also reached a record total of 19 weeks at number one on the digital songs chart.
There has been a clear increase in the consumption of catalog songs driven by the growth of streaming. Through September of this year, catalog songs that were released more than 18 months ago, accounted for more than half of the streams on Spotify Global Top 200. Due to the big success of Michael Jackson's biopic, his catalog generated more than 3 billion streams on Spotify's Global Top 200 in the nine months since January of this year, increasing from approximately 100 million in calendar year 2025.
Gen Z listeners accounted for approximately half of the increase in streams, illustrating how the power of visual storytelling has revitalized our catalog and attracted new listeners. We believe such evergreen catalogs are assets that will continue to generate value over the long term, even in the age of AI. Next is the picture segment. FY 2026 Q2 sales increased 48% year-on-year to JPY 513.7 billion, and operating income was approximately 7x higher at JPY 92.6 billion. This was record high operating income for the second quarter. For the full fiscal year, we increased our sales forecast 6% compared to our previous forecast to JPY 1, 760 billion, and our operating income forecast 33% to JPY 200 billion, primarily due to an increase in revenue from theatrical releases.
Spider-Man: Brand New Day," released in July, was a record-breaking hit with worldwide cumulative box office revenue exceeding $2.5 billion. It is the highest-grossing film of all time in North America and the third highest-grossing film of all time globally. Following the film's release, unit sales of related game titles approximately doubled, and all the SME-released features in the film have generated more than 1 billion cumulative streams.
This demonstrates how the real-world experience of watching the movie in the theater serves as a catalyst for enhancing IP value across the Sony Group in multiple ways. SPE has a strong lineup of upcoming releases. There is "Jumanji: Open World" this December and the animated film "Spider-Man: Beyond the Spider-Verse" next fiscal year. The success of theatrical release not only contributes to performance in a single fiscal year, but also generates significant revenue opportunities in the future through post-theatrical distribution windows.
We will continue to strive to deliver compelling films by combining our global beloved IP and creative strengths with our global marketing and distribution capabilities. Regarding the anime business, which is centered on Crunchyroll, we are combining the strengths of our Sony Group companies to expand our content offering and broaden our reach to fans to achieve sustainable revenue growth.
To expand our content offering, we launched Crunchyroll Storyworks. Through this initiative, Crunchyroll, Aniplex, and SPE aim to collaborate with Japanese creators to strengthen the adaptation of stories from around the world into anime and produce live-action adaptations of Japanese anime. To expand our reach to fans, we plan to introduce a dedicated Crunchyroll hub on the PS5 home screen next spring.
This new feature aims to capture the cross-demand between games and anime, which share a large overlap in their fan bases, by providing a cross-discovery feature that allows users to seamlessly discover related content. We will continue to focus on expanding our reach by creating in-person fan experiences in collaboration with Japanese publishers and production partners.
Through these initiatives, we aim to further raise global awareness of anime, expand our fan base and addressable market, and solidify the mid-to-long-term revenue growth of the Sony Group's anime-related business. Next is the ET&S segment. FY 2026 Q2 sales decreased slightly year-on-year to JPY 567.8 billion. Operating income increased 5% to JPY 64.1 billion, primarily due to the impact of U.S. tariff refunds, despite the impact of the lower sales. The full-year forecast remains unchanged from the previous forecast.
Although conditions remained challenging in the imaging business this quarter, primarily due to a slowdown in the Chinese market, we minimized the impact of increased memory cost and lower unit sales on earnings by expanding market share, led by new products, and by accelerating the shift toward high-value-added products. Regarding the joint venture with TCL, discussions between the two companies to finalize the details of the joint venture's organizational structure and operations are progressing smoothly ahead of full-scale operation in April of next year.
True RGB BRAVIA, which was launched in June and has been selling well around the world, features a suite of high-value-added technologies that are expected to contribute significantly to improving the profitability of our display business this fiscal year. Combined with TCL's business scale and cost competitiveness, we expect these technologies to become a major competitive advantage for the joint venture from next fiscal year.
Major competitive advantage for the joint venture from next fiscal year. Last is the I&SS segment. FY 2026 Q2 sales decreased 6% year-on-year to JPY 577.6 billion, and operating income increased 12% to JPY 154.6 billion. This was a record high for quarterly operating income. Our sales forecast is essentially unchanged compared with the previous forecast at JPY 2 , 120 billion. We have increased our operating income forecast 7% compared to the previous forecast to JPY 450 billion.
In the smartphone market this quarter, growth declined approximately 20% year-on-year, mainly due to the impact of conditions in the memory market. Although the market for mid-range and lower phones declined significantly, we believe the decline in the high-end market was limited. Shipment volumes of our mobile sensors have trended generally in line with the market.
We expect the proportion of shipments in the first and second halves of this fiscal year to differ from the prior fiscal years due to supply chain inventory levels and changes in customer product cycles. We will continue to adjust our sales forecast for the current fiscal year while monitoring factors such as supply constraints for components used in end-user products, such as memory, and the impact on demand of rising prices for high-end products.
Thanks to the dedicated efforts of our on-site staff and the support of our partner companies, operations at Kumamoto Technology Center, which was damaged by the July 28th Kumamoto earthquake, have already recovered to pre-earthquake levels. However, we have reflected a loss of approximately JPY 16 billion this fiscal year in our result forecast, primarily due to the damage to work-in-progress inventory, equipment repairs, and lost opportunities during the production downtime.
On August 11th, Sony and TSMC signed definitive agreement to establish a joint venture. Through collaboration with TSMC in the joint venture, we expect both companies to enhance the performance and cost competitiveness of image sensors and drive the creation of new value in the era of physical AI. We also expect to lay the foundation for further improvement in the capital efficiency of this segment over the long term. While some of the profit we recorded in the first half of FY 2026 came from such things as U.S. tariff refunds and demand being brought forward, we achieved consolidated operating income of over JPY 1 trillion for the first time in history for either half of the fiscal year.
We believe this strong performance was achieved through the symbiotic combination of the stable growth in our distribution platforms, including PlayStation Network and Crunchyroll, and hit content driven by our strong IP and creative talent, such as Spider-Man, Marvel's Wolverine, and Ella Langley. In our next mid-range plan, which begins next fiscal year, we plan to maintain this momentum and aim for further growth across the ecosystem of the entire Sony Group. This concludes my presentation. Thank you.
That was announcement from Ms. Lin Tao. From 16:50, we will have the Q&A session for media, and from 17:15, we would have the investors and analyst Q&A session. Q&A session will be 20 minutes each. For those of you who had registered with your questions, you can click Join Webinar, and please wait in that status. For how to pose questions and also for the cautions, please refer to the documentation that we have sent to you in advance.
Please wait a few moments. We will be starting the media Q&A session shortly, so please wait a few moments. Thank you for waiting. We will now begin the Q&A session. First, I will introduce you today's presenters. We have Corporate Executive Officer and Chief Financial Officer, Ms. Lin Tao. Senior Vice President in charge of Accounting, Mr. Hirotoshi Korenaga.
Senior Vice President in charge of Corporate Planning and Control, Mr. Naoya Horii. First, we take questions from the media. For those of you who have questions, please click raise hand button on your Webex screen. Please keep your questions up to two questions per person. Who have a question, please go ahead. First question from Nikkei, Mr. Yoshida, please.
Yes, I am Yoshida from Nikkei. Can you hear me?
Yes, we can hear you.
For the game, I would like to ask two questions. First question is, in 2026, full year forecast, the operating income, you had revised so that the game software, I think there is impact from that, but aside from your own software, but the Grand Theft Auto VI, is it because that it is more favorable performance? That is the first question. The second question is about the next generation platform.
How is the development going? I do not think there was explanation about that, but from this year, so that you are going to have the investment in earnest for the next generation platform. So, please tell us how it is progressing. Is it progressing according to schedule? Also, for this year, so G&NS, the development, is it going to surpass the FY 2025? Is that correct? So those two questions, please.
All right. Thank you for the question. The first question is that for the operating income, operating profit, so that we had revised upwards. The reason is that the third-party software itself had surpassed our expectations, and that, as I have been saying, in MAU of September, so we had 127 million account, and then the play time has been quite favorable. So engagement itself is quite good, going on very nicely.
Third-party sales is due to those high engagement of the game players. For those titles that we are going to be releasing, I cannot go into the details of what we are going to do, but we have very high expectations towards that. For the second question, this is a next-generation R&D. We are progressing as scheduled. For the next-generation investment, the second half would be a large impact of the investment amount, and the development itself is on schedule. Maybe there are some changes due to the accounting rules, so that maybe that can be made in next year, not this year. Thank you.
We would now move on to the next question. Toyo Keizai, Yamashita-san, please.
This is Yamashita from Toyo Keizai. I hope you hear me.
Yes, we hear you.
I have two questions. The first question about looking at the year-to-date for the second half, you have upwardly revised the operating income. The year-to-date, how much was the upside compared to your original estimation? The second question is about your gaming business, about securing. You mentioned that you are deciding how to secure the memories for the next year. GTA VI launch might be one of the reasons the users will purchase the new PlayStation. Hardware sales, will it be the same as normal years? What is your expectations on hardware sales next year?
Your first question is about the operating income, year-to-date operating income. How much was it higher than originally forecasted? Horii-san will explain later, and I will answer the second question. GTA is encouraging users to repurchase the hardware, and what is the outlook for the next year? This year, even after the price adjustment of hardware, sell-in and sell-out had good momentum. On the other hand, the hardware life cycle, gradually, we are expecting less sales of new hardware.
For new hardware sales, in terms of units, this will go down gradually. But we want to manage the profitability of hardware without incurring big losses. In addition to that, we already have about 100 million units of PS5 installed, and also there are PS4 users amounting to 127 million accounts. How we can have these players play and increase their engagement, this will be our focus. About the first half, we would like Horii-san to answer.
Looking at the performance expectations per quarter, we do not disclose, so my answer will be qualitative. In the second quarter, the upside of Marvel's Spider-Man was the biggest factor. In addition to that, there was strong gaming engagement. These were the two main reasons for increased revenue and profitability. The extent is about four digits. Thank you.
The next question, please. Freelance, Nishida-san, please.
This is Nishida. Can you hear me?
Yes.
I have two questions. First, we see increase in cyberattacks, and what impact is it having on Sony? As for the SIE network, for the family account, there seems to be some impact, but other businesses included. For example, what are you investing in to come up with measures? What monitoring are you carrying out? So what sort of impact is it having on your business? The second question about the image sensors for smartphones and the market conditions. Can you elaborate? Currently, I think that there is a weakening in the market, but the Chinese market impact included, especially your high-end market where you're strong. How do you predict the market to develop, please? Thank you.
The first question, I will respond. The second will be by Horii, about the cyberattack impact. First of all, we are aware that there have been a series of incidents, and we as management take this seriously, and we apologize to the customers and stakeholders to whom we have inconvenienced. We would like to take this opportunity to express our apologies.
As for the specifics, there are different incidents, and I cannot give the details, but cyberattacks are becoming more complex and sophisticated. Even more in the past, we recognize that we need to put in measures. Going forward, because we can use AI on the defense side as well. So including that, we want to increase its priority and take out corporate-wide activities. About the smartphone shipment, Horii will respond.
Yes, thank you for the question. Smartphone product market situation. There are different survey companies which are providing us with data, but basically, the low end and mid-range dip versus the high end. I think the impact is less in the high end. I think there is a difference in situation between these two segments. Mainly in China, the high-end market is.
Amongst the brands, there are quite a different situation. The manufacturers which have a large share are becoming stronger, and those others are losing their share. That is what we're seeing right now. That is our understanding. As for the future, we have to exercise prudence. We have to observe more carefully the market before making a judgment. That is all. Thank you.
All right, so we go to the next question. From Sankei Newspaper, Takagi-san, please.
Yes, this is Takagi from Sankei Newspaper. Can you hear me?
Yes, we can hear you.
Yes, I have one question about the cyberattack, related to the cyberattack. You said that you are not going into the details, individual matters, but SIE, what happened at SIE, I do not think that there is any formal announce yet, but SNS, we hear on the social media that the customers have very much concern about what happened. The PlayStation service, regarding the PlayStation service, what kind of cyberattack impact do you have? Can you explain about that?
Yes, thank you for the question. About the PlayStation account, what kind of impact of the cyberattack. We are now making the investigation and that, yes, we had already taken measures to counter this attack. For the customers who has been impacted, we had already took appropriate measures. Please understand that we had taken appropriate measures. Thank you.
Let us move on to the next question. Please press the raise hand button on the Webex screen if you have any questions. There seems to be no more questions, so we would like to close the Q&A session for the media. The Q&A session for investors and analysts will begin at 5:10 P.M.
[Presentation]
Okay. We will be starting questions from investors and analysts soon, so please wait until we resume. Okay. Thank you for waiting. We will now take questions from investors and analysts. I am Shinji from the IR department, and I will be serving as your moderator. The same three panelists from the media session will answer your questions. Please, let us now begin the Q&A session. If you have a question, please click the raise hand button on your Webex screen. Please limit your questions to two per person. Munakata-san from Goldman Sachs, please go ahead. Munakata-san, do you hear me?
Thank you. I am Munakata from Goldman Sachs. Thank you. I have two questions. Number one is about gaming, and the second question is about the overall situation. About the gaming business, you mentioned that the engagement has been rising. The MAU playtime is already very high. Thinking about next year onwards, do you think there will be further upside to the engagement next year onward? What type of users do you think will be more active? This month, there will be a launch of a big title, so there will be big momentum in the holiday season, but how do you think the market will keep on growing continuously?
That is my first question. My second question. The entertainment business, you have upwardly revised, that is gaming, music, and pictures. So, your capability to generate revenue and profit is increasing. I think your communication with investors is getting more active because the next mid-range plan will be starting from next year. So, which businesses do you think will have still room for growth, and what will be the driver? Maybe it's not one single business, but ecosystem as a whole. Please give us hints on where the upsides reside.
Thank you for the question. About your first question, gaming. How we see increase of MAU and engagement next year onward. For us, MAU, playtime, and ARPU, the monetization part, the ARPU especially, will become very important KPIs. MAU and playtime is depending on how interesting the game titles are. The game which is about to be launched, I think, will be a big catalyst on increasing these KPIs.
GTA VI, there will be contribution this fiscal year, but even looking at series games titles in the past, these games have driven the growth for multiple years. So, I think this new title will be contributing even after next year, but this is not the only driver. There are thousands of game titles on the PlayStation platform already. One or two, and also, there may be surprise hits which we do not yet anticipate.
So, that is what is interesting about the gaming business. So, I think these high variation of interesting games will be driving engagement. About your second question about the overall picture and where the upsides are, there are many upsides. First of all, finally, in my opinion, we have been investing on entertainment for many years, and finally, we are seeing mega hits every year, and we will be able to deploy the IP in a very multilateral, multifaceted manner.
So, we are now going into that stage. Looking at the platform, not only PlayStation Network, Crunchyroll is growing, and also cross-discovery of PlayStation and Crunchyroll, I think the platform will be activated further. In addition to that, the semiconductor joint venture with TSMC. Up till now, Sony was advancing linearly, but this JV will bring a new way for us to advance and grow. So, I have high expectation on that too. Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you, Munakata-san. Next question. BofA Securities, Hirakawa-san, please.
Thank you. My name is Hirakawa from BofA Securities. Well, it is a short-run question about gaming. The memory prices are rising, and you said that you have secured the necessary volume, but next fiscal year, if you are to introduce a new console, I think that the game profitability will decline as a result of having to make investments. So, the next fiscal year's memory price and forecast, well, is it to the level that you can absorb it from pricing policies?
In case of new console, for example, at the gross margin level, will there be a break? So, can you explain about your forecast for next fiscal year? The second, from next fiscal year, image sensor strategic customer share will not be 100%. So, you are communicating with the strategic customers. What sort of scenario can you anticipate? On our part, I think that your strong position will remain in place, but can you explain about the impact? Thank you.
About your question regarding our gaming business and the profitability from next fiscal year onward. As you say, the memory prices will be one of the challenges the management will face. On our part, I am looking at the gaming business on the whole. One of the most important index is the healthy game platform. We have 127 million accounts, and how actively they engage and how we can monetize in a sound way will be key to supporting our profitability. In addition to that, from this fiscal year onward, there will be the investment for the new platform. For future growth, we have to attach great importance to our new platform.
We have to make the necessary investments for that. We have to support this soundness of our platform and try to think how rationally we can invest in our platform, and we can announce that at appropriate timing in the future. About your second question about our major customers and image sensor customers. About our customer procurement strategy. We are not in a position to comment, but on our part, we do have to assume certain scenarios.
I cannot give you the details, but in general, the customers will source from different sources. I think this is normal business practice that we must assume. In line with that, of course, our company have to think about our production capacity in line with the scenarios that we are assuming. For us, what does this mean? Basically, our technical competitiveness, cost competitiveness, and need to be maintained. I think there will be fierce competition, and so what we can control is our technical superiority and cost superiority. With that in mind, from next fiscal year and after, we will make the plans. Does Mr. Horii have something to add? Thank you.
Speed will be key, I think. We have to try to adapt to the changing environment and run our business next fiscal year and onward. The TSMC collaboration that we have announced this time, amidst this fierce competition, in order for us to win, we have to work with them and work on both our technical and cost front and win in the market ultimately. That is all. Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you, Hirakawa-san. All right, next question. From JP Morgan Securities, Ayata-san, please.
Yes, thank you. I am Ayata from JP Morgan Securities. I have two questions. For the gaming, the second quarter actual and the full year estimate. For the second quarter, as you have been explaining to us, that second quarter active user had increased and the play time has increased very strong. I would like to ask the background factors. How do you analyze why it was so strong? The first quarter to second quarter, it is the case that it goes down, but it has not been the case this time. Maybe there was special factor for that. That is the first point.
The second question is about for the same gaming industry, about the profit going up, but the cost improvement you have said, but the cost improvement, what kind of a cost improvement? Is it due to the development or is it for the sales promotion or other cost factors? If possible, please tell us about the hardware. It was 9 million in beginning of the quarter, but is there any change to that?
All right, thank you very much for the question. First of all, the second quarter engagement, the background factors to that, and the gaming engagement in most cases depend on the way people play the games. It's not everything due to the seasonality factors. In that sense, if you have the large-scale titles, for those of you to play, the big titles has been launched the new season, and the engagement would go up.
That's usually the case that goes up with the big titles release. In any sense, it's very positive that people play longer hours and engage. We have big titles that we launch very shortly, so that we hope that those momentum of having high engagement in the platform is a very good performance for us. The second one about the cost improvement. The forecast, compared to the last time forecast, we can see cost improvement. That's your question, right? That is because for the next generation title development, timing is different.
The next generation investment itself, we are on schedule, but some of them, the accrual basis is different, so that it's going to be on next year's. Because of the lag in the timing of the quarters. About the hardware sales, how many units we expect. We had 9 million at the beginning of the quarter as a guidance. I refrain from saying the actual numbers, but what we had set at the initial period, we are having more units than what we have prepared at the initial stage. Thank you.
If you have any questions, please press the raise hand button on the Webex screen. Next question. SMBC Nikko Securities, Katsura-san, please.
Thank you. I am Katsura from SMBC Nikko Securities. I have two questions. Number one is about I&SS, and the second question is overall. About I&SS, due to the change in the new product launch, you said the seasonality will change from the past. Looking at the appendix, the capacity and wafer input, the actual wafer input went down. I think that was impacted by the Kumamoto earthquake. I want to confirm that. Also, how do you perceive seasonality? Will this be leveled more? Also, how you hold inventory.
Before, you had high inventory in Q2 and Q4, while Q4, Q1 had lower performance. Please let me confirm that. How you spend the money, looking at the cash flow from operating activities, JPY 1.6 trillion. You have upwardly revised by JPY 100 billion. Looking at the business environment of entertainment as a whole, how you will be investing, and how you see the environment, and how you see the potential targets of investments. Please elaborate on your strategic investment.
Thank you for the question. Your first question was about the production and how we hold inventory for semiconductors. Horii-san will be answering that question later. The second question was about capital allocation and strategic investment, which I will first respond to. You are right when you say our operating cash flow has been upwardly revised. In the current midterm, our operating cash flow generation capacity has increased steadily.
Currently, while we invest in the growth investment, while keeping the financial health, we still have room to increase shareholder returns. About the strategic investment, we have already made the decision on JPY 1.5 trillion of strategic investment, and we will continue to strategically invest mainly in the entertainment business. Horii-san will now answer the first question on semiconductor.
This is impacted by the timing of the launch of the new products by the customers. As you say, the third quarter had highest volume, because there was this end-of-the-year sale. But this fiscal year, some of the new products were not launched back in September. For the second half, there was some impact to the volume in the second half. But we are talking about the cycle here.
But once this cycle transition is complete, it is just a matter of timing. I do not think there will be much impact on the full-year volume. But this fiscal year is a transition period, so that really changed the balance between the first and second half. You also had a question about the volume of the wafer input. The input of the wafers have actually gone down, and as you say, this was impacted by the Kumamoto earthquake. That is all. Thank you.
Thank you. Time is limited, so the next will be the last question. SBI Securities, Tsuru-san, please. Thank you. First question. There seems to be an audio problem. The Americans are suffering from high interest rates, and likewise in Europe.
Thank you for the question. As a holiday season, we are seeing inflation worldwide. How do we see the business given this environment, I think was the question. Yes, inflation is on the rise worldwide, and especially for the hardware, we are seeing high prices and prices rising. This is something that we are paying attention to. Because of high prices, how the demand will change is something that we have to look out for, because we are selling the end product. It is an important indicator. But other than hardware, when it comes to contents and service, it is less impacted by inflation and such a business environment. Our entertainment business, it accounts for 70% of our net sales and profit. This impact, the inflation impact is less. We have to continue to see how inflation will affect the consumption behavior. That is all. Thank you.
It is time for us to end our Sony Group earnings announcement. Once again, thank you for your attendance.