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The Group also used the opportunity to announce the joining of four new
manufactures. Onkyo and Meridian were mentioned as with plans to manufacture
HD DVD products, and Chinese manufacturers Alco (Venturer) and Shinco were
quoted with similar plans.
Alpine, a mobile audio equipment manufacturer, also demo at the show an HD DVD
car player.
HD DVD studios also declared plans to manufacture at least 300 new HD DVD titles
during 2007 (raising the total of above 600), of which hybrid HD DVD/standard DVD
discs would become a larger share than today.
Hybrid discs are a feature of the HD DVD format that the HD DVD Promotion Group
made special emphasis on their presentation.
The Group considered important to facilitate the transition from the current DVD
format to the HD DVD format, a transition that also respects the consumer’s
investment purchasing media. The hybrid media would be playable on a current
DVD player as well as on an HD DVD player when the consumer is ready for it.
Titles and Blu-ray Player Sales
25 Blu-ray movies were released during 3 weeks in Jan 07, compared to 11 titles
from HD DVD. Also, according to studio sources, from the volume perspective, two
movies on Blu-ray disc were sold for every one sold on the HD DVD format during
January, perhaps due to the higher number of Blue ray titles released on that period,
perhaps also for the effect of having now PS3 available.
From another perspective, over the first 3 weeks of January Blu-ray outsold HD DVD
on individual titles, Blue Ray’s Crank with 7500 sold units, while HD DVD’s top seller
Batman Begins sold 4100 units, according to studio sources.
The title comparison above is not a clear-cut comparison because the titles appeared
as first release at different times and are not of the same movie, although they were
both considered top sellers on each format during the same period.
However, eProductWars.com, an Amazon related site, the movie The Departed
released by Warner’s (a dual format label) on February 13 has been the title that
sold more units on both formats for the past month, Blu-ray ranks # 36 as topselling
product while the HD DVD version ranked # 45th as of February 8th.
Another sign of market movement is the recent offer made at some retail-store
chains, such as Best Buy, of 2 Blu-ray movies for the price on one (of a selected
group of 6 titles in the $25 range). This type of incentive is needed to create sales
momentum, I have not seen HD DVD doing similar promotions in the same period
(first week of February 07).
Another factor to consider is studio and title variety, all studios except for Universal
Studios Home Entertainment are releasing titles in a constant basis on the Blu-ray
format.
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