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Tech sites turned into battlegrounds again this week, when stats from an NPD report about Blu-ray sales were made public—and weren’t supposed to be. Now NPD is speaking out.
Although the report was not ready for release, it stated (via BetaNews) that Blu-ray sales accounted for 93 percent of the high-def market during the week of January 12. NPD doesn’t say that the numbers are false, but admits that one week’s sales are hardly a long-term indicator.
They also said that deals that bundled free Blu-ray players with TVs had a lot to do with the jump for Blu-ray. Sharp and Panasonic both had offers; Sony alone offered $400 off the two together.
NPD chose not to get specific about the HD DVD drop, but Toshiba had something to say. The manufacturer agreed with NPD about long-term sales and cited rebate promotions as a factor for the fall. However, they also see a bright side. “Since Toshiba’s retail price move on Jan. 13th to $149/$199 – we are seeing very positive sales results at retail,” Jodi Sally, Toshiba Digital A/V Group marketing VP, told Twice. “All of our consumer research and our experience indicates that retail price is the primary motivating factor in consumers’ purchasing habits and we are confident that Toshiba’s HD DVD players represent a significant value to the consumer.”
According to NPD, the report did not include sales from Xbox or PS3 sales, as well as online sales from retailers such as Amazon, where the Toshiba HD-A3 holds the number one slot.
sony tried with betamax and lost.
sony costs to much
toshiba is getting cheaper
lot less problems with hd
who do you is going to win think about it da.
I don’t think downloading is oversold at this time anymore than any new technology/medium has been. The time frame is short enough to concern Sony - though not as much as SD DVD/Upconversion.
Downloading is here right now - and while not “full” HD it will be fairly soon. (remember on a small population cares about the details). In essence any OnDemand system is a download system and they are moving into full HD - XstreamHD being one example. It is just a matter of time, and the market is there to be worth being aggressive. And time is what the marketing analysts have to look at - market window - always shorter than it appears due to critical points in ramp up time and decline time (when profit making thresholds are crossed).
What the future could quickly be is a typical AV receiver, except with Ethernet, storage, decoding (already have the audio and some video). It’s just a few chips, a drive, some connectors - and a wireless keyboard. That with decent broadband connection - and even if you don’t get instant access, you could still download a full featured equivalent of an hd media source.
No, not today - but close enough that more and more people will not bother to commit to plastic.
Downloading HD is oversold at this point in time. Some countries have the bandwidth but most don’t or are capped. Plus, it’s HD lighter.
Some news today:
“Massive technology research house Gartner says that the HD format war that has been raging for nearly two years will end in 2008. Guess who they think will take the prize? Blu-Ray of course.”
The war has just started. The battle was HD DVD vs. Blu-Ray. Score one for BR. Taps for HD DVD. The real War is the future. 1 - Get people to not just pick up a $49-$99 upconversion player (which most J6P customers would probably be happy with) and 2 - Pre-empt the customer base from hearing about the future of downloading and then just sit and wait for it.
Sony needs to sell players (and a few discs too) to make up their battle costs - and to make some money off BR. If they don’t accelerate the market they will loose a lot money and status.
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Ummmm, Netflix just went Blu-ray solo….
Universal and Paramount will decide to go Blu-ray unless they want investors in an uproar over loosing out on three times as many sales.