Sony risks large inventory backlog in a bid for smartphone market share growth

Sony is gearing up for an ambitious sales plan that it hopes will see it ship 65 million smartphones during fiscal 2014, according to Taiwanese press reports.

Citing supply chain sources, DigiTimes reports Sony is gearing up to boost its smartphone production orders by 55% year-on-year, with the company set to produce 16.25 million units per quarter.

If the reports are accurate, such production volumes would mean Sony would need to ship more smartphones than any other company, aside from Samsung or Apple, in order to avoid building a large inventory backlog.

As SmartCompany reported in August, during the second quarter of 2013, Samsung shipped 71.3 million units, followed by Apple with 31.9 million, LG on 11.4 million, Lenovo at 10.6 million and ZTE on 9.6 million units.

The new devices are likely to be assembled by FoxConn, Compal and Arima, with Qualcomm and MediaTek processors powering the devices.

The company is also set to launch a Firefox OS smartphone during 2014.

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