Though it’s been less than a week since Sony announced their plans to buy the remaining 50% stake in their joint venture with Ericsson, Sony CEO Sir Howard Stringer is already looking beyond that. In a recent conference call which took place after the mentioned announcement, Mr. Stringer went on to note that Sony will phase out all feature phones from their lineup, like the W995 (pictured below,) and, nigh-on, the entire Walkman range of handsets.

 We’re phasing out feature phones. 

Sony Ericssons current CEO, Hans Vestberg, who many believe will head Sony’s mobile phone operations, once the buyout is completed also commented on the matter and further confirmed Sir Howard Stringer’s strategy.

 First of all, Sony Ericsson has gone through a big transformation. They will take the decision they need to make for the company to succeed. And I guess it’s a question for the company more than for us. 

To be clear, feature phones are non-smartphone models; think pre-iPhone. Such a move will have Sony Mobile focus and create strictly smartphones, which currently comprises of Android OS, though there have always been rumors that Sony may embrace Microsoft’s Windows Phone OS as well.

Discuss:

Do you think its smart for Sony to phase out all feature phones and focus on purely smartphones, or is there still a largely untapped audience in emerging markets like India and China which Sony could have focused on and profited from? A rebuttal to that of course would be Samsung and Apple, who only create smartphones, and both have profited enormously from it.

[Via Pocket-Lint]