The first English-language history of Sony, published by Crown in 1976 and based on extensive interviews with co-founders Akio Morita and Masaru Ibuka. Written at a time when Sony was still an insurgent — the Walkman had not yet launched — the book captures the company's early philosophy, its struggles to break into the American market, and the personal partnership at its core. Lyons, a journalist, documents Sony's transition from a small Tokyo startup making rice cookers and tape recorders to a global brand whose name was synonymous with quality.
The Sony Vision is valuable because it was written before the legend ossified. Lyons interviewed Morita and Ibuka when Sony was still fighting for respect in global markets, not defending a legacy — the transistor radio was a breakthrough but the Trinitron and Walkman were still unproven bets. The book captures Morita's philosophy in its formative stage: his insistence on building the Sony brand name rather than doing OEM manufacturing for American companies, his conviction that quality would win over price in the long run, and his willingness to move to New York personally to open the US market.
For founders, the early chapters on Sony's founding and first decade are the richest. Ibuka's original founding memo — 'to establish a place of work where engineers can feel the joy of technological innovation, and to contribute to Japanese culture' — is a mission statement that predates any product. Lyons shows how that mission guided specific decisions: staying independent rather than selling out to a larger Japanese zaibatsu, investing in research that had no immediate commercial application, and treating the brand as an asset worth more than any single product line. It is a study in how to build a company that outlives its founders.