Toshiba Still Fighting For HD DVD
By William on Monday, January 14th, 2008 at 4:23 AM PST In Gamer Life, Hardware, Microsoft, Sony, Sony
After Warner Bros. and other studios announced they were going exclusively with the Blu-ray format, we all assumed that the high definition format war was over. Toshiba Corp. isn’t throwing the towel in the ring just yet. Toshiba America, Inc. stated that it plans to increase its marketing campaign this month for HD DVD. Toshiba plans to combine an aggressive marketing campaign with “extended pricing strategies” to combat recent developments that all but spelled doom for the HD DVD format.
This sounds like a last-ditch effort by Toshiba, but you never know what will happen in the world of business. Perhaps this is Toshiba’s way of trying to save some face before the end. Nearly every media outlet has crowned Blu-ray the victor, so I find it hard to believe that HD DVD still has a chance of any kind. For now, the format war is apparently not completely over, but it’s certainly close to the end.
General Electric Co.’s (GE) Universal Studios and Viacom Inc.’s (VIA) Paramount Pictures support the HD DVD format, while Sony Corp. (SNE), Walt Disney Co. (DIS) and News Corp.’s (NWS) Twentieth Century Fox have exclusive Blu-ray production deals.
Via CNN Money
Apparently Toshiba really does plan to fight to the bitter end. Toshiba has just placed new orders for blank HD DVD-RW from a Taiwanese manufacturer, which means Toshiba plans to stay in the market with HD DVD…
http://www.digitimes.com/systems/a20080114PB203.html
They should give up now before losing any major amount of money.
I’m sure Toshiba will stay in the market until it’s completely over. They’ve invested a fair bit into the HD-DVD format, and now it looks to all be a loss. They’ve got a vested interest in pushing for format viability.
Perhaps they could ask Sony for some tips on what to do with a format that becomes obsolete. I mean, Sony had Betamax, which found acceptance at a broadcast level; and MiniDisc, which many radio stations still use today. At least they got something out of their investment.
Good point with the MiniDisc.. honestly that’s a format I wish had done well with the public.