Sony Corporation resolved at a meeting of its Board of Directors today to obtain an authorization by shareholder resolution to be adopted at the 85th Ordinary General Meeting of Shareholders scheduled to be held on June 20, 2002 for purchases of its own shares pursuant to Article 210 of the Commercial Code.

1. Rationale for obtaining authorization by shareholder resolution

In order to continue to maintain the flexibility of purchase of its own shares to the extent of number of shares and total purchase price as granted prior to the amendments to the Commercial Code which had been achieved by the authorization under the Articles of Incorporation, Sony Corporation will obtain an authorization by shareholder resolution for purchases of its own shares on the same scale as before in lieu of the authorization under the Articles of Incorporation which had been eliminated due to such amendments to the Commercial Code.

2. Details of authorization

• (1) Type of shares
  Shares of common stock and shares of Subsidiary Tracking Stock linked to Sony Communication Network Corporation ("Tracking stock")
• (2) Number of shares
  Common stock: Up to 90,000,000 shares
  Tracking stock: Up to 300,000 shares
• (3) Total purchase price
  Common stock: Up to 650 billion yen
  Tracking stock: Up to 1 billion yen