Akio Morita

Akio Morita was a Japanese entrepreneur and co-founder of Sony Corporation along with Masaru Ibuka. He was born in Nagoya, Japan, in 1921, into a family that had been involved in sake, miso, and soy sauce production for generations. He was expected to take over the family business, but he had a passion for mathematics and physics, and graduated from Osaka Imperial University with a degree in physics in 1944. He served in the Imperial Japanese Navy during World War II, where he met his future business partner Ibuka at a study group for developing infrared-guided bombs. After the war, Morita joined Ibuka in Tokyo, where they founded Tokyo Telecommunications Engineering Corporation in 1946, with funding from Morita's father. The company developed magnetic recording tape and sold the first tape recorder in Japan in 1950. They also secured the licensing of transistor technology from Bell Labs in the 1950s, making Sony one of the first companies to apply transistor technology to non-military uses. In 1957, they produced the first pocket-sized radio, and in 1958, they renamed their company Sony Corporation, derived from the Latin word for sound and the American expression "sonny". Morita was responsible for the financial and business matters of Sony, as well as its marketing and global vision. He founded Sony Corporation of America in 1960, and moved to the United States for a year in 1963 to learn about American business practices and culture. He also opened factories in the United States and Europe, and made Sony a major competitor in the electronics industry. Morita pioneered the concept of branding, making sure that the name Sony was prominent on all products and refusing to sell products to other businesses to be packaged under their labels. He was an advocate for all the products made by Sony, and introduced innovative products such as the Walkman, the Betamax, the Trinitron, and the CD player. He also diversified Sony's business into music, film, and gaming, acquiring CBS Records and Columbia Pictures, and launching the PlayStation. Morita was a leader in the Japanese business community, and served as the chairman of the Japan Business Federation from 1989 to 1991. He also wrote several books, including Made in Japan (1986), which was an autobiography and a manifesto for Japanese business. He received several awards and honors for his achievements, such as the Albert Medal from the Royal Society of Arts in 1982, the Legion of Honor from France in 1984, and the First Class of the Order of the Sacred Treasure from Japan in 1991. He also received honorary doctorates from several universities, such as Harvard, MIT, and Oxford. Morita suffered a stroke in 1993, which left him partially paralyzed and unable to speak. He resigned as Sony's chairman in 1994, and died of pneumonia in Tokyo in 1999, at the age of 78. He was survived by his wife Yoshiko and their three children, Hideo, Naoko, and Masao. Morita was widely regarded as one of the most influential and visionary entrepreneurs of the 20th century, and a pioneer of Japan's economic and technological rise.