
Kaz Hirai has announced that he will be retiring from the position of Chairman of Sony on June 18, 2019. He spent nearly a year in the position of director and chairman at Sony. Last year, he stepped down from the position of CEO and now he will finally retire from Sony as director and chairman.
He started his journey as a president of Sony Computer Entertainment in 2006 after PS3 was launched. He is the main person behind the success of PlayStation as a brand especially PlayStation Network as well as Sony itself. He helped put PlayStation on the right track after the somewhat sloppy launch of the PS3 system.
In 2012, he was made the president of the entire Sony Corporation which lasted until 2018 and during this time Sony excelled in a lot of departments. Under his command, Sony was in a very stable position and it has been ever since after Kaz took Sony out of its miserable state during the phase in which it was losing a lot of money.
On the official press release, Hirai shares his comment which is as follows:
Since passing the baton of CEO to Yoshida-san last April, as Chairman of Sony, I have had the opportunity to both ensure a smooth transition and provide support to Sony’s management. I am confident that everyone at Sony is fully aligned under Yoshida-san’s strong leadership, and are ready to build an even brighter future for Sony. As such, I have decided to depart from Sony, which has been a part of my life for the past 35 years. I would like to extend my warmest gratitude to all our employees and stakeholders who have supported me throughout this journey.
Kaz Hirai might be retiring from his official position as director and chairman at Sony, upon Sony’s request he will still be part of Sony’s management team as a Senior Advisor. Sony states:
While Kazuo Hirai will retire as Chairman, Sony Corporation, on June 18, 2019, he will continue to provide counsel as requested by Sony`s management team, acting as Senior Advisor for the Company.
We wish Kaz Hirai all the best for his retirement and we hope that Sony sees the same amount of growth in the next years that it saw under Kaz.