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Will Industry Hug It Out With Toshiba's New Blu-ray Focus?
August 11, 2009
I wonder if there will be some "I told you so's" hurled Toshiba's way, upon its decision to apply to the Blu-ray Disc Association. It wasn't that long ago that Toshiba was so confident about its support of the now dead HD DVD format.
Toshiba has announced it's hoping to join the BDA upon starting to develop its own line of Blu-ray players and computer drives. The company hasn't said when exactly these products will launch.
To me, industry reaction seems genuinely positive towards Toshiba. I haven't detected any smugness from long-time Blu-ray backers.
Futuresource, the U.K.-based research firm that picked Blu-ray from the beginning, believes Toshiba is making a smart move. Today Futuresource, notes that Blu-ray players are expected to significantly grow in 2009, and Toshiba would of course want to enter the high-def hardware fray.
"Our quarterly BD hardware tracker shows European BD player sales, excluding PS3, are running at close to 300% up on the equivalent period last year and clearly Toshiba is keen to get its share of this business," said Jim Bottoms, company director at Futuresource. "Retail prices are declining fast and we expect to see players at or below £80/100 Euros by the Christmas selling season."
He predicts that by 2012, 50% of the U.S. and 35% of Western European disc sales volume will be in Blu-ray.
Posted by Susanne Ault on August 11, 2009 | Comments (1)
