Funai launching Blu-Ray players, Fall 2007, in North America

[dolphinius_rex]

Looks like Funai has finally thrown their weight behind a format in the HiDef format wars, and they have chosen Blu-Ray:

Japan's Funai to launch 42-inch LCD TV and BD player in N. America, says paper

Compiled from outside sources by Lisa Tsai; Emily Chuang, DIGITIMES [Thursday 21 June 2007]


Japan-based Funai Electric plans to launch a 42-inch full high-definition (HD) LCD TV and next-generation Blu-ray Disc (BD) player in North America in fall, according to the Japanese-language Nihon Keizai Shimbun.

The 42-inch LCD TV will adopt panels from Taiwan-based players while the TV will be assembled in China, the paper cited sources in saying, adding that the first batch of the shipments of the 42-inch TVs will be 100,000-200,000 units.

http://www.digitimes.com/displays/a20070621PB205.html

There's no two ways about it, this week has been brutal to HD DVD. Can it recover?

[Grain]

Does Funai sell under their own brand (I'm not familiar with the name), or do they build for others?
Hopefully it will be a reasonably priced.

[Wesociety]

From the earlier reports about Funai, I believe they sell to other "Brands", so we probably won't see the player under the Funai name.

[dolphinius_rex]

Does Funai sell under their own brand (I'm not familiar with the name), or do they build for others?
Hopefully it will be a reasonably priced.

Funai Electric Co., Ltd. (船井電機株式会社, Funai Denki Kabushiki-gaisha?) (TYO: 6839 ) was established in 1961 in Osaka, Japan. Funai in Japan is engaged in the development, manufacture, marketing, and distribution of information and communication equipment such as Internet access terminals, computer peripherals, audio-visual devices, televisions, VCRs, DVD players, and home electrical appliances. Funai is currently the main supplier of TVs and DVD players to Wal-Mart stores for Black Friday (shopping) sale, the day after Thanksgiving. It has recently begun to be the supplier for TVs manufactured under Walmart's house brand, Durabrand. In fact, sales to Wal-Mart now account for 30% of the company's net income.

Funai has established a worldwide production structure, which includes bases in Japan, Germany, Malaysia, China, and Mexico.

Funai manufactures products under the Emerson, Sylvania, and Symphonic brands. Funai also makes a few products for Hitachi, ilo Walmart, SV2000 Walmart, Insignia Best Buy, Pye Circuit City, Magnavox, Mitsubishi, Philips, and Sharp. Funai also manufactures most DVD players for Denon, digital cameras for Kodak, and printers for Dell and Lexmark.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Funai

Wikipedia isn't perfect, but it sounds like they're a pretty huge player in the tech manufacturing industry, especially for North America.

[Grain]

Funai also manufactures most DVD players for Denon

That's interesting. Denon started outsourcing their lower end players(which are still quite decent) to China a couple years ago, might just have been to Funai.

[dolphinius_rex]

Funai also manufactures most DVD players for Denon

That's interesting. Denon started outsourcing their lower end players(which are still quite decent) to China a couple years ago, might just have been to Funai.

Maybe? It sounds like it would make sense though.

[vinnie97]

Dolphin, your Blu-Ray hard-on is making the forum difficult to read.

[dolphinius_rex]

Dolphin, your Blu-Ray hard-on is making the forum difficult to read.

Sorry, no HD DVD news to post right now really. Ian already covered Toshiba's comments about not being fazed by any of this... which I'm sorry, was a MAJOR disappointment even to me.

Really I'm trying to keep a fairly open mind about the format war, at least in terms of my posts here. I could be posting a lot more news then I have been, and I could actually start giving my full opinion on the state of things... but I'm holding alot of that back, for the time being at least.

The long and the short of it though, is that I don't believe that this format war is benefitting people, and the sooner everything is switched to a single format the better, and the sooner people will be able to start mass adoption. I'm not exactly keen on the whole idea of 2011 still being dominated by DVD, but if we keep both formats around needlessly, then I think that could easily end up being the case (as some have theorized).

But I tell you what, if I hear any particularily good HD DVD news in the next while, and Ian doesn't beat me to posting it, I'll make a thread for it, ok?

[vinnie97]

Thanks!

I actually think this format war is going to drive prices down MUCH quicker than if we just had one closed format raking in all the enthusiasts.

[Wesociety]

I actually think this format war is going to drive prices down MUCH quicker than if we just had one closed format raking in all the enthusiasts.

There is no doubting that. These formats have dropped in price faster than many other new formats, historically.

[dolphinius_rex]

I actually think this format war is going to drive prices down MUCH quicker than if we just had one closed format raking in all the enthusiasts.

There is no doubting that. These formats have dropped in price faster than many other new formats, historically.

I'm sure it's pushing HD DVD, as their main strategy is to be priced lower then Blu-Ray. But I'm not 100% sure that Blu-Ray is changing their pricing strategy too much because of Toshiba/HD DVD. Well, I'm willing to bet that Sony's current player's MSRP price drop of $100 BEFORE it even launched, was probably due to the format war. But I think that Samsung and Panasonic are doing what they would do either way. If anything, the format war is hindering true mass production of either format's players, so it's forcing companies to make less money or inflate their prices to cover the difference.

Keep in mind that just because there is incentive to lower the price, many companies supporting Blu-Ray don't have the benefit of being able to sustain below cost players like Sony and Toshiba, so in the short run this format war might look nice to people, but in the long run it's damaging things.