Last week, I paid a visit to Sony Interactive Entertainment's (SIE) Cloud Gaming Engineering & Infrastructure team in Orange County, California, who are in charge of development and operations for PlayStation™Now (PS Now).

A group picture with the PS Now development/operations team. Next to me on the right is Ueli Gallizzi, who leads SIE's Cloud Gaming Engineering & Infrastructure team.

Based on my own experience working at So-net's network services business for many years, I was very much looking forward to hearing about the ways in which PS Now's network minimizes latency and delivers game streaming experiences to users in real-time.

The PS Now network is comprised of 15 data centers and 33 network PoPs (Points of Presence) strategically distributed around the globe. By connecting data centers in out-of-town locations to PoPs in areas closer to users through robust (approx. 100GB/s) long-haul and metro links, PS Now is able to provide low-latency game experiences to users. In addition to its physical network infrastructure, PS Now also develops and operates the software stack that seamlessly connects the client, network, and servers, from the time users select a game and commence streaming, to the time they end their play session. Real-time data is gathered and analyzed across all parts of its operation.

Being briefed on network operations that utilize real-time data.

As I touched on at the recent Quarterly Meeting, our 2012 acquisition of GAIKAI laid the foundations for the PS Now service. We took a lead on the competition by launching PS Now as a game streaming service in 2014, and it now offers subscribers access to more than 800 titles across PlayStation®3, PlayStation®4 (PS4®), and PC. Many of our users are also taking advantage of the downloading feature, which we offer for select titles on PS4®. I believe this download option is also one of the differentiators that sets us apart from the competition.

PS Now's streaming technology also forms the technological foundations of its current remote play capability, which allows players to enjoy their games anytime, anywhere. Through remote play, users can access high-quality PS4® titles both at home or out and about, and the service can now also be accessed from Android smartphones and tablets, iPhone, iPad and PC. It is also important to note from the perspective of anytime/anywhere that PS Now servers always offer the latest versions of all games, forgoing the need to wait to install a software update. This offers significant time-value to our users and is one of the benefits of this service.

Turning our eye to SIE's competitive landscape, in addition to Microsoft's xCloud (planned launch in 2020), Google's Stadia cloud gaming service will be launching on November 19. Ahead of these moves by our competitors, on October 1, SIE announced a global service renewal of PS Now, featuring strategic price restructuring and the limited-time addition of popular titles such as "God of War" to the service's library. We have seen a steady climb in subscriber numbers since this renewal, and the total number of subscribers has already exceeded one million as of the end of October. Game streaming through the cloud has the potential to strongly impact the direction and development of the entire video game industry going forward, and I expect SIE will continue to be pioneers in this domain, and strengthen and drive the evolution of the PS Now service.

■ Mid-range Plan Meeting for Games, Music, and Pictures businesses

Following my visit to PS Now, we held a mid-range plan meeting for the Games, Music, and Pictures business at SIE headquarters in San Mateo, California. Over the course of two days, top management from SIE, Sony Music Entertainment, Sony/ATV, Sony Music Entertainment (Japan), and Sony Pictures Entertainment gathered to discuss potential business opportunities around IP/DTC, One Sony and digital entertainment in emerging markets under the theme of "Growth."

As I have said at the Quarterly Meeting and elsewhere, the Race-to-DTC and Race-to-Talent are megatrends that exist across the Games, Music, and Pictures industries. As competition intensifies, one of the key advantages for us as Sony Group is One Sony, and our ability to turn our diverse businesses into our strength. Recently, I am pleased to see more examples of synergy between our Games, Music, and Pictures businesses begin to materialize. During the SME session at the mid-range plan meeting, Rob Stringer highlighted a recent article in Rolling Stone magazine which noted that while One Sony "has always been a nice idea on paper," it is now becoming a reality. I feel there were many key takeaways and lessons from our discussions, and particularly from each of the presentations at this meeting. It proved a highly productive meeting where we were able to share ideas on growth strategies based on strengthening each individual business, One Sony, and the expansion of digital entertainment in emerging markets.