TOKYO (AP) — Sony expects a smaller annual loss after blockbuster movie releases, cost cuts and robust holiday gadget sales boosted quarterly earnings more than sevenfold.

The Japanese manufacturing icon, known for products like the PlayStation 3 game console, yesterday said its net profit for the October-December quarter jumped to 79.2 billion yen ($861 million) from 10.4 billion yen a year earlier.

Robust revenue from movies, personal computers and financial services lifted revenue by four percent to 2.24 trillion yen.

Sony said it benefited from strong worldwide theater releases such as "2012" and "Michael Jackson's This is It," as well as home DVD sales of titles like "Angels & Demons."

Since taking over in 2005, Sony chief executive Howard Stringer has been trying to unite the company's sprawling business, improve efficiency and rein in costs.

The Tokyo-based company's latest results suggest the Welsh-born CEO's initiatives are paying off, pushing Sony toward a recovery next year with a helping hand from the global economic recovery.

"I don't expect a very rapid recovery of the economy," said Nobuyuki Oneda, Sony's chief financial officer. "But it looks to have bottomed out, and I think we should be able to manage."

The maker of Bravia TVs and Cyber-shot cameras credited ongoing restructuring and better currency exchange rates for turning its consumer products and devices division profitable again.

The company has cut 20,000 jobs and aims to shave 330 billion yen in costs this year. It will have closed 12 factories by May.

As a result, Sony swung to an operating profit, which some analysts see as the best indication of a company's pure business performance, of 146.1 billion yen. The Tokyo-based company booked an operating loss of 18 billion yen a year earlier.

The company's PC business also did well, in large part due to higher sales of Vaio computers.

Gaming consoles declined mainly due to lower sales of the PlayStation 2 and PSP portable device. But PlayStation 3 sales jumped more than 40 percent to 6.5 million units during the quarter, Sony said.