Charlie, one of my reasons for calling Kyocera a marvelous company is the way it maintained its market dominance in ceramic mounts for chips. Kyocera quickly established itself as the lowest cost producer and maintained that position for years. New technology provides a substitute for ceramics under certain conditions, but KYO has been able to deal with these changes by broadening its product base.
Sony, on the other hand, made several major errors that resulted in others dominating the VCR market. More recently, Sony has attempted to establish a new standard for flash memory in cameras, MP3 players, and other appliances, using designs that are already outmoded in terms of size, performance, and price. They were unable to make QPE into a profitable division and finally abandoned the whole handset field (for cellular) altogether. Why, in heaven's name, would Sony be a good partner? Kyocera, meanwhile, is fully committed to CDMA and has already established a successful handset business in Asian markets. Kyocera also assists in the spread of CDMA technology in areas in the far east that have been difficult for American companies to get a foothold. |
