For some of you around the world, it has been almost two months since you started working from home to help prevent the spread of COVID-19.

In my previous blog I wrote about the social significance of Sony's businesses. Once again, I would like to express my gratitude to all of you around the world who continue to push forward with our socially significant business activities in the face of unprecedented challenges. I am of course also continuing to dedicate myself to advancing our progress, while keeping the health and safety of all Sony employees and their families as our foremost priority.

In Japan, we recently had our Golden Week holiday that, including the weekend, lasted for five days from May 2nd to May 6th. In this blog, I'd like to share an update on my holiday activities and reading, as well as some recent news stories that caught my eye.

■ Taking walks with wena

During this time off, I set a small personal goal of walking or cycling with my son for three hours each day while avoiding crowded areas. I was able to mostly accomplish this goal and recorded an average of around 10,000 steps per day. Incidentally, I used the wena wrist to track my daily steps, a product that resulted from the Sony Startup Acceleration Program that supports the launch and operation of startup initiatives. The wena wrist also includes a contactless electronic payment feature, so I was able to enjoy the convenience of stopping to purchase refreshments without taking my wallet with me. I think that "contactless" technology will play an ever more important role within society going forward.

	You can turn your watch into a smart watch by exchanging your band.

■ The Ride of a Lifetime

Next, I would like to touch on the book "The Ride of a Lifetime," written by former Disney CEO Bob Iger, which I read over the holiday. More than simply exploring his management philosophies, I felt this book was more like a memoir of Bob Iger's life.

Mr. Iger started his career at ABC, one of the big three U.S. TV networks, in 1974, after which ABC was acquired first by Capital Cities and then later by Disney. He went on to become the CEO of Disney in 2005 and oversaw a succession of major acquisitions, including Pixar Animation (2006), Marvel Entertainment (2009), Lucasfilm (2012), and 21st Century Fox (2019). He stepped down as CEO in February of this year.

The book includes a vivid account of the tense discussions that took place during the fifteen-phase interview process Mr. Iger underwent with the Disney board of directors before ultimately being selected as CEO. The key concepts of the vision he presented at that time included creating high-quality content, technological advancement and global growth. He also recalls his work to dissolve the bureaucracy within the Disney headquarters that had led to latency in decision making and impacted employee morale. It was truly a compelling read.

■ Other topics of interest

Finally, I'd like to share two news stories from over the holiday that are related to Sony.

The first topic is a concert by SME artist Travis Scott called "Astronomical" that was performed virtually within Fortnite, the hit battle royale game that is particularly popular among teenagers.

The concert was performed on five separate occasions in late April, and while I was not able to experience the concert for myself, I understand that the level of interest was such that before the concert users were given advance notice that, "Doors open 30 minutes before the show. Get in early to secure your spot!" and during the event itself the number of concurrent users surpassed 12 million people. Furthermore, it is estimated that a large number of fans that attended the virtual event did so through PlayStation™Network.

The song that debuted, "THE SCOTTS," reached number one spot on the weekly global track chart and had the most first-week streams of any track so far this year. After the event, views for Travis Scott music videos quadrupled and the audio-streaming numbers for his songs doubled, which I think makes this an incredibly interesting case study to keep in mind when exploring how to carry out live events in the future, and who to target with our entertainment.

The second topic is in relation to patents, and the so-called "IP Landscape." According to a commentary published in the Nikkei Daily on May 4th, there is a strong trend among Japanese corporations to increase the number of patents they own in order to enhance the "intellectual property power" of the company. However, in the patent world, the cost for maintaining these patents increases in proportion with their number. This article explained that Sony is an exception to this trend, commending our approach to reducing our overall number of patents while improving the quality of each as a strategy for maintaining "intellectual property power," and asserting that Sony is comparable to Alphabet Inc. when it comes to average patent quality. As Sony is a company based on technology, it is extremely encouraging to receive such objective praise.

Created by the IP Incubation & Investment Department, Intellectual Property Division,
Sony Corporation using the PatentSight service referenced in the original article