The Origin Of The Name SONY

(From The Avid Yahoo User's Group/Wikipedia)

We use their equipment everyday but does anyone know how SONY arrived at it's name?

In 1945, after World War II, MASARU IBUKA started a radio repair shop in a bombed-out building in Tokyo. The next year he was joined by his colleague AKIO MORITA, and they founded a company called TOKYO TSUSHIN KOGYO K.K.

The name SONY was chosen for the brand as a mix of the Latin word "SONUS," which is the root of sonic and sound, the English word "sunny," and from the word SONNY-BOYS which is Japanese slang for "whiz kids."

However, "SONNY" was thought to sound too much like the Japanese saying soh-nee which means business goes bad.

Morita pushed for a word that does not exist in any language so that they could claim the word SONY as their own (which paid off when they sued a candy producer who also used the name who claimed that "Sony" was just an existing word in some language).

At the time of the change, it was extremely unusual for a Japanese company to use Roman letters instead of Chinese characters to spell its name.

The move was not without opposition.

TTK's principal bank at the time, MITSUI, had strong feelings about the name. They pushed for a name such as SONY ELECTRONIC INDUSTRIES, or SONY TELETECH.

Akio Morita was firm, however, as he did not want the company name tied to any particular industry.

Eventually, both Ibuka and Mitsui Bank's chairman gave their approval.