Chapter 2 of Sony's story

Chapter 9 of war

Chapter 9

Although our company is still small, we believe that Japan is a very large and potentially dynamic market. Japanese industrialists have a consensus, that is, Japanese companies must export products to survive. We have no natural resources except human capabilities, and Japan has no way out. So we naturally stare at foreign markets. On the other hand, as business grows more and more prosperous, it is obvious that if you don't turn your eyes on the international market, it is impossible to make your company as well as what I originally imagined. We want to change the image of poor quality of Japanese goods, and we infer that if we want to sell high-quality and high-end products, we must have a well-off market, that is, to find a rich and tasteful country. Today, 99% of households in Japan have color TVs, and 98% of households have refrigerators and washing machines, tape recorders and stereo sound systems with penetration rates between 60% and 70%. But in 1958, that year after we produced a bagged transistor radio, only 1% of Japanese people had TVs, 5% had washing machines, and 2‰ had refrigerators. Fortunately, Japan's economy began to develop rapidly since the middle of 1950s. Double-digit GDP growth and low inflation rates have greatly boosted consumer spending. Many people said that the real post-war period in Japan started in 1955, and that year we invested the first transistor radio into the Japanese market. The country's GNP grew rapidly, with a growth rate of 10.8%. Japanese households needed every kind of goods, and at that time the deposit rate was very high. I remember that it was over 20%, so people could afford it. Thanks to the strong momentum and rapid growth of the domestic market, coupled with the potential international market, our world began to shine brightly.
As a new company, we must win a place for ourselves in the Japanese market. The old company is resuming production and creating a brand that people are already familiar. We must create our own brands. We have launched new products for this purpose, and even made up some new terms for them, such as "tapecorder" [English tape (TAPE) and recorder (tape recorder) the splicing of two words-the translator], but later I found that such innovation also has a bad side. When we put the first tape recorder into the market, it was not well known in Japan. Of course, we cannot register the word "Tape Recorder (tape recorder)" as an existing one, so we have to propose "tapecorder ". Because only our products are available on the market, the name of tapecorder became a household name almost overnight. Later, when our competitors began to make tape recorders, people called the tape recorders produced by all manufacturers "tapecorder". Whether this phenomenon is worth celebrating is really doubtful. Since then, we have specifically stressed that we have clearly marked the company name on our products, even though we still create new names for some products, such as Walkman [walking in English) the combination of man and man is the name of Sony Walkman, which is also often called a "Walker" in China-translator]. In this way, the trademark name, the company name and product name are clear.
Although Japan was getting richer in the late 1950s s, it was still difficult for us to raise funds. We had to rely on our friends and their introductions to find people who could invest. In this regard, we are fortunate to have an advisory committee that plays a real important role. They will introduce us to potential investors we cannot find. From 1953 to 1959, the chairman of the committee was SI Lang Wan daishun, former chairman of Mitsui bank. Other Advisers included Jin Shen's father-in-law, Maeda domen, and former cabinet minister; tian Dao daozhi, who has served as the Director of the Inner Palace; Song Gu Lun, who used to hire Jing Shen in the photography and Chemistry Laboratory, was the first time Jing Shen came out to do things; of course, there was also my father, Sheng Tian JIU Zuo weimen.
One of the possible investors recommended by the consultants was Shi xiaotai, who later served as the leader of the Japanese economic group alliance (CEN. Jing Shen and I visited him and persuaded him to invest in our company. But a few months later, Mitsui Bank invited him to become the president of Tokyo zhipu Electric Corporation (Toshiba, this is because of financial and Labor troubles. At that time, the post-war anti-trust law had taken effect, so he felt that Sony was a very small company, even though Toshiba was a huge company, he still cannot hold shares in another company that produces the same product. He gave his shares to his daughter and friends. When Toshiba produced its own transistor radio, it was certainly much later than our company, and he advised his daughter to sell his shares. He told her that no small company can compete with the Japanese electric giant, and now these big companies are also starting to produce the same products. Shi Ze's daughter is a good friend who lives around me. She often joked: "My father is a successful industrialist and a giant in the Communist Youth League, but he doesn't know how to make money for himself." She was a filial daughter and sold Sony's shares as persuaded by her father. She lost a chance to make a fortune.
Hichina, our chairman of the Board, is a big banker in Japan. Before the war, he was the leader of Mitsui bank. At that time, in the eyes of Bank staff, he still had the same role as God. Like other financial valves related to the old Financial Group, he was also cleaned by the occupying authorities. We are lucky to have him. Mitsui Bank helped a lot from the very beginning, but it was difficult for Jing Shen and I to borrow more money from it for a while. One day, I went to Mitsui bank to talk to the bank manager about our company. We have always wanted to sell shares, and we hope that hichina can explain the situation to the bank. When we visited, we were surprised that hichina told everyone in a command: "My company has decided to add shares. I can arrange for you to buy more ." This is just a command, which can be said from a big man's mouth. Later, several people in charge of the bank told me that they spent a lot of money to buy our shares. They thought they had to buy it, because hichina actually had the command. But no one has ever regretted it. When I bought our stock, a few people made a fortune. As far as I know, one of them quickly built the house with his early dividend.
We have done well, but if we want to establish a reputation in Japan, we have to go through fierce competition. And once the Japanese believe in a brand of goods, they will become loyal users of that kind of goods. But in foreign countries, we are on the same basis. Maybe we are better than other companies. No one knows about Japanese consumer goods before the war. The quality of any product with "Made in Japan" was very poor when it was shipped abroad before the war. I have heard that many people in the United States and Europe only know about Japan in terms of paper umbrellas, kimono, toys and other cheap goods. When selecting a company name, we did not intentionally hide our identity, and according to international rules, we must also specify the country of origin of the product, but we do not want to emphasize this, we are afraid that we will be rejected before we can demonstrate the quality of our products. At the beginning, I had to admit that we always printed the line "Made in Japan" on the product as small as possible. Once it was too small, US Customs forces us to reprint it.
From my early experiences trying to sell tape recorders, I realized that the market is actually a communication. In traditional Japanese consumer goods distribution systems, manufacturers and consumers are separated from each other and cannot communicate with each other. The product must pass through the first, second, or third wholesalers to reach the retailer. The producer and the end user are separated by another intermediary. This distribution system has some social value. It can provide a large number of employment opportunities, but it is costly and inefficient. Every time a hand passes, the price will rise once, and some middlemen even don't even get the goods. Maybe this system is suitable for daily necessities and low-tech things, but we realized at the beginning that it could not satisfy our company and our company's high-tech new products. It is impossible for third-or fourth-party approvers to become interested and enthusiastic about our products and ideas. We must teach users how to use our products. In doing so, we must establish our own channels to bring our products to the market in our own way.
We have launched many products that we have never seen before in the market and have never actually made. For example, transistor radios and solid-state individual televisions, we have begun to enjoy the reputation of leading new trends. Some people call us experimental rats in the electronics industry. If we produce a new product, the giants in our industry will wait to see if our product will succeed. If it succeeds, they will launch a large number of identical products to the market, taking full advantage of our efforts. This has been the case for many years. We always play first. Most of our main products are like this, from small solid-state radios, transistor televisions (the first one we made) to today's Walkman) watchman and discman ). We introduced stereo into Japan; we made the world's first home video recorder; we invented a single-gun, three-bundle Color Display System, which is a new way to project color images to the TV display; we have improved the computer's 3.5 inch floppy disk, which is the world's largest storage. Our handheld cameras and small video recorders have brought a revolution to TV news collection and playback around the world. We first created a mavika film-free camera and a CD system, and also invented 8mm video tapes. Here we just list a small part of our achievements that is easier to understand.
At the beginning, our success records were not yet established, so when we developed a product into the market, our competitors will take a cautious wait and wait-and-see attitude. In the early days, we often monopolized the market for a year or longer, and other competitors believed that the new product was successful. We make a lot of money, and the entire market is ours. But when we get more and more successes and our performance becomes more and more obvious, the wait time for others to get into the market becomes shorter and shorter. Now we can only take the lead in new products for three months, and other people will enter the market and launch similar products they produce. (We were lucky to have a full year of portable CD, but only six months of portable CD .), It should be proud to say this, but it is too costly. We must reserve a fee for the improved product. Over the years, we have spent more than 6% of our sales on research and development, or even 10% in years. Our plan is to use new products to guide the public, rather than asking them what they need. The public does not know what they can buy, but we know. Therefore, we do not conduct a lot of market research, but improve our ideas on the use of products and products, and then educate the public through communication to create a market. Sometimes, I naturally come up with a new product idea.
For example, the Walkman is a well-known Walkman. This idea was formed in this way, with a patio deep into my office, he brought a portable stereo tape recorder we made and a pair of standard-sized headphones. He looks unhappy and is not satisfied with the weight of the system. I asked him what he thought. He explained: "I want to listen to music, but I don't want to disturb others. I cannot sit next to a stereo recorder all day long. I used this to solve the problem. I carried the music with me, but the machine was too heavy ."
I have been thinking about this for a long time. Now, as Jing Shen said, it has become a focal point. According to my experience at home, young people now cannot live without music. Almost everyone has a stereo recorder at home or in the car. In New York, and even in Tokyo, I saw people carrying large tapes on their shoulders sending out loud music. I remember one time when my daughter came back from a direct trip, she even ran upstairs without waiting to greet her mother and put the tape into the stereo recorder. A deep complaint prompted me to take action. I ordered our engineers to get a reliable small-sized tape recorder. This is our product called "Pressman". I asked them to remove the circuit and speakers of the recording and change them into a stereo amplifier. I explained other details I wanted, including very light head-mounted headphones. As a result, this requirement became one of the most difficult parts of Walkman development.
Everyone made me feel embarrassed. No one seems to like my thoughts. At a product planning meeting, an engineer said, "it sounds like a good idea. But if there is no recording function, will someone buy it? I don't think so ."
I said: "Since thousands of people have bought car stereo speakers, they do not have the recording function. I think these people will also buy such machines ."
No one laughed at me publicly, but I didn't persuade the project team, so they had to do it helplessly. Even before I made the first prototype, I decided that the sales price should be suitable for young people just as if they had bought a book. Pressman single-channel tape recorders are relatively expensive, selling for 49,000 yen in Japan, and I said our new stereo release cannot exceed 30,000 yen. The accountant protested, but I insisted on seeing it. I told them that I firmly believe that we will produce a large number of such new products, and the cost will decrease with the increase in production. They think we should start from a cheaper base than Pressman, but I choose the Basic Framework from Pressman because many of its parts are in stock at Sony service centers around the world, this model is also very reliable. Therefore, we can work with confidence without worrying about mechanical failures in the end.
Soon after, the first trial product was handed over to me, with a new pair of light headphones. I'm happy with its small size and high quality sound produced by headphones. Most of the energy produced by sound in the traditional large-horn stereo recorder is wasted, because only a small part of the sound can reach the user's ears, and the rest of the sound only causes the vibration of walls and windows. Our small machine only needs a little battery energy for the amplifier to drive light headphones. The fidelity of light headphones is as good as I expected, or even better. I rushed home with my first Walkman and tried to listen to all kinds of music, but I found my wife unhappy and she felt cold. Well, I decided to provide two earphones. After another week, the production department made another model with two headphone jacks.
A few days later, I invited my golfer and novelist to play golf. When we drove to the club, I handed him a pair of headphones and asked him to listen to a box of tapes. I brought another headset and watched his expression. He was surprised and happy to hear that his wife, the concert pianist Nakamura Nakhon Nakamura, was playing grisey's piano. He smiled happily and wanted to say something, but he was not good at talking because we had headphones. I immediately realized that this was a potential problem. My solution is to have our staff Add a button-controlled microphone to the camera so that they can talk to each other over the music through the "hotline.
I think we have produced excellent things. I am enthusiastic about this, but our sales staff are not satisfied. They say this kind of things will not be sold out. I am very excited about such a thing that most people think is useless. However, I am very confident in the vitality of this product, so I stated that I am willing to take responsibility for it. I have no reason to regret it. This idea persisted in this way, and the Walkman just came out to win the championship. In fact, I have never really liked the man name, but it seems to be very popular everywhere. When one of our young people chooses this name, I just went on a trip. When I came back, I ordered them to change the name, such as walking stereo (walking stereo), which is slightly more syntactic-compliant. But they said it was too late, the advertisement was done, and the product was named. Sony's American company and Sony's British company are worried that products that do not conform to the syntax such as man cannot be sold, but we still insist on not modifying them. Later, although we tried other names in overseas markets, stow away in the UK, and sound about in the United States, these names were not applauded, while man was well-known. Finally, I called Sony's American company and Sony's British company and told them: "This is a command, just use man !" Now I have heard that there is a famous man.
Soon it was very difficult for us to keep up with the ordering requirements, so we had to design new automatic machines to deal with the surging orders. Of course, our overwhelming advertisements have also promoted sales. In Japan, we hire young couples to go for a walk to the walking paradise in Tokyo Ginza on Sunday, and listen to man while walking. At the beginning, I thought it was not polite to listen to music alone, but users thought that their small machines were completely personal. When I still want people to share Walkman, I found that everyone is only willing to enjoy themselves, so we simply dropped the "hotline" and then removed a headset Jack from most models. I always thought that man would become a popular product, but I was not even prepared. When the sales volume reached 5 million, I raised a question to the project team that was once skeptical. I expect this is just the beginning. Since the launch of the first man, we have sold more than 20 million machines, a total of 70 different models. We have even developed waterproof and sand-proof models, and more varieties are emerging.
Very interesting. mongoman removes some functions from the recorder, but now it almost goes through a circle. We also return the previously removed functions, or add some additional devices, for example, a small speaker or even something new, such as copying a tape to another disk.
I leave the theme and talk about these stories with simple intentions. I don't believe any market research will tell us that Sony Walkman is going to succeed, let alone become a hot topic, which has caused many counterfeits. This gadget has literally changed the habit of listening to music for thousands of people around the world. Many of my friends in the music industry, such as the conductor Albert. feng. karayan, Zhu Bin. mata and Arlin. marsel and ishake, an artist. steane and others contact me and want to get more Walkman. This is an encouraging affirmation of my ideas and advantages of the product itself. As a result of developing the Walkman Series Small and Light optional accessories, we can narrow down the standard headphones, improve its sound quality, and produce dozens of new models, we have become one of the world's largest earphone manufacturers. In Japan, we have 50% of the market.
When we first wrote the launch books and basic principles for the company, we had such an innovative plan, and he wrote: "If we can establish an environment, let people unite in a strong team spirit and voluntarily exert their technical capabilities, such an organization can bring an incalculable pleasure and incalculable benefit."
He Considers industrial creativity, which refers to collective creation of novel and appropriate products. Machines and computers do not have their own creative capabilities, because creativity requires not only the processing of existing information, but also human thinking, natural intuition and great courage, we were able to meet such conditions in the early days.
We began to build our own sales and distribution network so that our information could be directly met with users. We still use the original distribution system in an appropriate situation, but we have also established our own channels. As long as possible, we always deal directly with dealers. In this way, we can know themselves and make them understand the value and purpose of our products. Our dealers have become disseminators and we encourage retailers to do the same.