Sanyo name to cease by April 1, 2012, Panasonic tells partners

The news comes off the back of Panasonic forecasting its biggest annual loss in 10 years, and news the company is looking to cut more than 15,000 jobs worldwide. The company has been particulary affected by the strong yen, which is at a decade high against the euro.

The company is also scaling down its TV department and reducing its production capacity for plasma panels by 48 per cent. Two Japanese plants have already been suspended, and it has scrapped plans to relocate panel manufacturing facilities in China.

AV Magazine spoke to Tony Marder, MD of AV integrator Audiovisual Southwest about the impact the announcement will have on the channel; “We’ve had no indication from Panasonic whether they’re going to take on the products under their own brand. Panasonic has released some small projectors this morning.

“Sanyo has been the workhorse of the projector industry for many years. It will be a shame to see the name go, especially with customers who have respect for the brand.

“But it’s too early to say what the effect will be on the chain. It will definitely be a blow, but this industry has a habit of fighting back. To me it’s a question of what Panasonic wants to do with the product. Panasonic’s product range is currently not big enough, and there’s no-one in the marketplace with equivalent products.

“It’s therefore all down to whether Panasonic takes on the product, albeit under a different brand.”

Panasonic has recently cut its annual TV sales target to 19 million from 25 million amid competition from Samsung and LG.

“Panasonic is having a really hard time because the company has to work on two restructuring plans at the same time,” Koji Toda, chief fund manager at Resona Bank in Tokyo told Bloomberg. “One is Sanyo and another one is downsizing the TV department.”

“We’ve sought measures to solve deficits at the TV unit since 2008 but none brought a result that we anticipated,” President Fumio Ohtsubo told reporters in Tokyo.

Panasonic bought Sanyo for 403.8bn yen ($4.6bn; £2.8bn) in December 2008, as part of the company’s desire to concentrate on solar panels and rechargeable batteries in the future.

Keep looking at our website as we will have more on this story as it develops.