Longtime Sony boss Shuhei Yoshida has announced he is leaving the company after decades, paving the way for new generations of leaders at the company.

“I’m leaving Sony Interactive Entertainment on January 15 2025,” Yoshida said in a new PS Blog interview. “It’s like announcing the launch date of a new game, [something] I haven’t done for a long time [laughs].

He added, “I’ve been with PlayStation from the beginning, and this is my 31st year with PlayStation. And when I hit 30 years, I was thinking, hmm, it may be about time for me to move on. You know, the company’s been doing great. I love PS5, I love the games that are coming out on this platform. And we have new generations of management who I respect and admire. And I’m so excited for the future of PlayStation. So you know, PlayStation is in really good hands. I thought, okay, this is my time.”

Yoshida started at Sony way back in 1993, which at the time was just formed as Sony Computer Entertainment from two separate teams that previously worked on separate projects.

“When I joined [PlayStation], it was still just a department,” Yoshida said. “Ken’s team was doing the development, and there was another team under Sony Music Entertainment Japan making games for Super Nintendo, and that was another small team preparing to make games for PlayStation.”

He continued, “So the two teams merged, Ken’s team under Sony and Sato-san’s team under Sony Music Entertainment Japan, to create Sony Computer Entertainment in November 1993.”

Yoshida remained a key player in the PlayStation brand through the years, eventually becoming president of Sony Interactive Entertainment Worldwide Studios from 2008 through 2019. He later moved on to serve other SIE projects.