Summary
- Lin Tao is Sony’s next CFO and the first woman to hold the position in the company’s history.
- Tao has been with Sony since 2000 and has steadily risen to prominence in recent years.
- The CFO role could open up the possibility of Tao being the President and CEO of Sony in the future.
PlayStation executive Lin Tao has officially been appointed as the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of the wider Sony Group. Not only will Tao be Sony’s first female CFO, but this role could also give her an inroad towards eventually becoming the President and CEO of the entire company.
Sony has undergone some major leadership changes in recent months. Hiroki Totoki, the vaunted current president, COO, and CFO of Sony, as well as the chairman of PlayStation parent company Sony Interactive Entertainment, is set to assume the sole position of President and CEO of the Sony Group starting April 1, 2025. Speaking of PlayStation, the Sony gaming division also promoted Hideaki Nishino to the role of President and CEO. Nishino was previously in a dual-CEO arrangement with PlayStation Studio Group boss Hermen Hulst.
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The upcoming Sony leadership rejigs will also see Totoki’s prior CFO position be taken up by Lin Tao, the current Senior Vice President of Finance and Corporate Strategy and Development at Sony Interactive Entertainment. Tao has been with Sony for the past 25 years, and a recent report from Nikkei Asia provides more insight into her CFO appointment and business acumen. According to the report, many Sony executives expected the vacant CFO role to go to Naoya Horii, a close associate of Totoki, but instead, the company has placed its confidence in Tao, who will be the first woman to assume the CFO position at Sony.
Soon-to-Be Sony CFO Lin Tao Has an Impressive Track Record
Tao joined Sony in 2000, initially lending her talents to the company’s PlayStation and mobile gaming divisions. 2016 saw Tao working closely with former PlayStation boss Kaz Hirai and current Sony CEO Kenichiro Yoshida, following which she secured the SVP role at Sony Interactive Entertainment in 2021. Tao reportedly played crucial roles in various major Sony acquisitions, most recently the $3.7 billion Bungie buyout in 2022. Since Totoki became the chairman of Sony Interactive Entertainment in 2023, Tao has been instrumental in helping him restructure the division, making her a natural candidate for a leadership role within Sony’s broader corporate structure.
Interestingly, the CFO position at Sony has historically been a stepping stone towards the President and CEO role. Both Kenichiro Yoshida and Hiroki Totoki spent several years serving as Sony’s CFOs before graduating to the President and CEO position, which means Lin Tao could also be on a similar trajectory. It remains to be seen whether this apparent trend holds up, but for the time being, Sony shareholders are quite happy with the leadership changes.
Sony
- Date Founded
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May 7, 1946
- Headquarters
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Minato City, Tokyo, Japan