I'd been following the acquisition on this, can't guarantee I saw everything.
Sony-Ericcson was a joint venture between Sony and Ericcson beginning in 2001, as you know. The acquisition was to finally take over the Ericcson half, as you know -
Sony Buys Ericsson's Stake in Joint Venture - WSJ.com
Yes, they are rebranding this year, as you know -
Sony dropping Ericsson out of the Sony Ericsson brand in mid-2012
But an acquisition and a re-branding doesn't allow them to walk away from their corporate commitments and obligations to customers.
Anything under warranty, they're obliged to honor.
Anything past end of life, support will be catch as catch can, same as if the changes never happened, same as if we were talking about any other brand.
It'll come down to marketing-politics and economics - from the marketing side, there's an upside in customer loyalty to support older handsets, but from the econ side, you hit a point where you're losing money by supporting old stuff and not selling new stuff. Again, that applies to any corporation.
Usually, in moves that rarely make any sense to us consumers, they split that somewhere down what some would call the middle and set support policy.
But handsets that will be supported, will be supported by Sony.
