TOKYO (Kyodo) -- Sony Group Corp. said Friday its sales hit a record high for the six months to September while net profit rose 36.5 percent, helped by robust sales of games and semiconductors.

Its net profit rose to 570.13 billion yen ($3.7 billion) on sales of 5.92 trillion yen, up 2.2 percent, with a weaker-than-expected yen also pushing up earnings, the company said. Operating profit jumped 42.3 percent to 734.18 billion yen.

Sales in its game and network service business grew about 12 percent to 1.94 trillion yen in the first half on brisk sales of game software such as "Astro Bot", the company said.

Sony Group this month launched PlayStation 5 Pro, its high-end iteration of the flagship console featuring upgraded graphics processing units, but maintained its annual sales forecast for the PlayStation 5 console at 18 million units.

President Hiroki Totoki said the newer version's high price of around 120,000 yen "has not had negatively impacted (PlayStation) sales."

Its semiconductor business saw a 27 percent growth in the top line to 889.05 billion yen as sales of its image sensors used for smartphones increased, according to Sony Group.

The movie business logged a decrease in profit as it has been impacted by the fallout of recent industry-wide strikes in Hollywood.

The company expects the U.S. dollar to trade at 146 yen and euro at 160 yen for the second half through March, compared to 152.6 yen and 165.8 yen in the first half, respectively, it said.

Every 1 yen fall against the U.S. dollar and euro boosts its operating profit by 2 billion yen and 6.5 billion yen, respectively, in its game, semiconductor, and electronics divisions, according to the company.

Sony Group lifted its sales outlook for the business year through March to 12.71 trillion yen, up from its previous estimate of 12.61 trillion yen, while leaving its operating and net profit forecast unchanged at 1.31 trillion yen and 980 billion yen, respectively.