It must really, really suck to work for Sony right now.

And I say this not as a Nintendo fan or Microsoft sympathizer, but simply as a working man. Last month, Sony was aiming to cut around 16,000 jobs, and according to Reuters, the ax may yet fall for many more.

Japan's Sony Corp (6758.T) is likely to announce closures of Japanese factories and major divisions early next month, the Times of London said on Monday, but the company denied any such plan existed.

The maker of Bravia flat TVs and PlayStation video game consoles faces halting sales and mounting piles of inventory in the wake of the financial crisis, even as a stronger yen bites into earnings.

Sony, whose empire encompasses semiconductors, movies and insurance, is braced for a series of measures that would abolish some of its domestic operations and transform the electronic giant's business, the Times said, citing company sources. "We do not plan to announce additional restructuring measures at this time," spokesman Atsuo Omagari said, in response to the report. "We don't have any such plan." -- Reuters

In spite of the earlier cuts, analysts have said that even greater measures will be necessary in order to secure growth. Whether any of these cuts will affect the PlayStation division, which hasn't exactly been on a winning streak lately and continues to lose money on each console made, remains unknown.

That leaves one to wonder if a scaled-back PlayStation division would still have any hope of evening the playing field against its competitors this generation. But then, it's too soon to even say if it matters or not.