Tech giant Sony swings to profit on PS4 sales

Japanese tech giant Sony swung to a net profit in the second quarter of its financial year, driven by strong sales of its PlayStation 4 video games.

Profit was 33.6bn yen ($278m; £182m) in the three months to September, compared with a 136bn yen loss a year earlier.

The results are big turnaround for the firm that has seen years of losses and undergone a restructuring, which has resulted in job cuts and asset sales.

Its first half restructuring charges were down 35% at 15.7bn yen.

But sales of its smartphones continued to decline.

"In the Mobile Communications segment, sales decreased primarily due to a significant decrease in smartphone unit sales resulting from a strategic decision not to pursue scale in order to improve profitability," the company said.

Overall, its sales fell 0.5% to 1.8tn yen despite the uptick in demand for PS4 games and image sensors.

Expecting to sell more PS4 consoles, Sony left its forecast for earnings for the year ending in March 2016 unchanged.

"Sales are expected to be higher than the July forecast primarily due to an expected increase in PS4 hardware unit sales and PS4 software sales," the company said.

The earnings report comes a day after Sony announced that it would take over Toshiba's image sensor business.