Although Sony has not officially announced this decision, it has confirmed to a Finnish news site that the Xperia series will no longer be sold directly in this country. Finland became one of the first European markets where Sony announced its withdrawal.
The situation in other European markets is also not better when most Xperia phone models, including the latest Xperia 1 VII model, are out of stock or cannot be ordered. While some products are still available on Amazon, Sony’s sales channels are rapidly shrinking.
In its statement, Sony also gave a vague reason for its decision to withdraw from the Finnish market, saying that it is “continuously evaluating market profitability and user demand, and focusing on online sales channels to make the purchase process more convenient for customers.” However, this wording does not clarify the situation, and the shift to “online sales” seems to be a sign of a shutdown rather than a new strategy.
This comes amid the troubled launch of the Xperia 1 VII as many people complain about the device automatically shutting down and restarting. The situation was so serious that Sony had to suspend sales of products in Japan and apologize to customers in Europe and the UK.
Outside of Europe, Sony’s presence in the smartphone market is also weak, even in its home market of Japan. Even the company has recently started outsourcing the production of high-end smartphone models to contract manufacturers, indicating that the company is looking to separate itself from the mobile business.