Has Sony Failed to Maximize the PlayStation Brand?

In 1995,

gave birth to a brand that became one of the strongest and most resilient around the world – PlayStation. Not since the creation of the Walkman had Sony produced a machine that held so much power and fostered so much fan loyalty.

The PlayStation 4 event, which was streamed live on February 20 to

, achieved higher ratings than many TV shows. In fact, it was watched by more people than

. More than

watched the debut PlayStation 4 trailer on YouTube last month, making it the most watched ad on the website. The trailer proved to be more popular than an ad from Samsung Mobile USA, which was viewed 21 million times. More than

have signed up for

“First To Know” list, which provides subscribers with info on when they can pre-order PlayStation 4 hardware, games and accessories. Fizziology, a social media research firm that has a

in predicting box office success, expects PlayStation 4 to be

this holiday season. All of this points to a couple of things. First, it reinforces the strength of the PlayStation brand. Any doubt that investors may have had was washed away the moment Sony unveiled the new console. Second, it shows that consumers are confident in Sony's ability to deliver a desirable game machine after only a few games were introduced. Despite this achievement, PlayStation's success seems to be limited to game consoles and the company's first handheld, PlayStation Portable. PS Vita, the company's second handheld, struggled at retail last year. The unit recently experienced renewed interest and

after the price was cut in that nation, but the device still has a long way to go before it can match sales of the PSP, which

. The same cannot be said for PSPGo, the weird alternative to the original PSP. Instead of adding new features to the mix, PSPGo discarded the UMD (Universal Media Disc) slot. Sony also modified the form factor, creating a slide-out gamepad that resembled the slide-out keyboards of old smartphones. Consumers were not enthused by this device, which quickly disappeared from the market and is frequently referred to as a

. After releasing the PSPGo, Sony was inspired to develop an Android phone with a similar design. While the device was promising, it

as well. Sony has been reluctant to release sales data for its first motion controller, PS Move, but the company's UK managing director

that sales could have been better. In March 2012,

reported that Sony had shipped (not sold) a total of 10.5 million units. Sony has not provided any further updates regarding how the controller is performing. Ten million might sound like a lot, but it is less than half of the

sold by

. PocketStation, an unusual memory card peripheral that featured a tiny screen, seemed to be a hit after selling a few million units in Japan. Sony had contemplated a worldwide release but decided to

instead. All of these were lost opportunities to further the PlayStation brand. While

has successfully evolved the Kindle beyond its e-reader roots, and while

has taken its iDevice concept beyond Macs and MP3 players, Sony has been unable to take the PlayStation brand to another level. The new console will do

well at retail. It might even break a few sales records. Unless something changes, however, that may be as far as the brand goes.