CES: Sony cheers Warner move; preps advanced Blu-ray players
By Susanne Ault -- Video Business, 1/6/2008
JAN. 6 | LAS VEGAS—Sony Corp. chief Howard Stringer reversed his previous description of the high-definition format war as “at a stalemate” in light of Warner Bros.’ abandonment of the HD DVD format and cheered what he now sees as a Blu-ray victory.
Stringer closed Sony’s Sunday press conference on the eve of the Consumer Electronics Show here by saying, “All of us at Sony are feeling Blu. But that is a good feeling. We thank Warner to release only in Blu-ray.”
The HD DVD format has shown pluck, with its set-tops—particularly Toshiba players—topping sales during the holiday season’s Black Friday week. But Blu-ray set-tops surged during December, overtaking HD DVD players, Sony VP Chris Fawcett told VB after the press conference.
“Every week after Black Friday, Blu-ray set-tops collectively beat Toshiba players,” he said. “During the week leading up to Christmas, Blu-ray set-tops were 67% of market share unit sales, and Sony was 50% of that.”
Sony will continue to advance the format with the planned 2008 rollout of two BD-Live/picture-in-picture players, the company’s first with these enhanced capabilities.
Pricing and street dates haven’t been determined, but Fawcett believes they could come as early as summer. The models are dubbed Sapphire 3 and Sapphire 4. Both are similar, but the latter will have more elite audio abilities.
To date, more than 4 million Blu-ray devices have sold, including PlayStation 3 units and set-tops, according to Sony. Toshiba has counted 1 million HD DVD set-tops and Xbox 360 drives in homes to date.
