As most of you know, Blu-ray has been dominating the next-gen DVD market since the beginning of the year. To help give HD DVD a
boost, Toshiba has been offering various promotions, including a $100 price drop on many of their players. These promotions have
apparently paid off. According to the HD DVD Promotional Group, consumers have purchased more than 150,000 players, giving HD DVD 60% of
the HD set-top market.
Three weeks into its aggressivespring retail and marketing campaigns, the North American HD
DVDPromotional Group today announced HD DVD is significantly ahead in thededicated consumer electronics player market with 60% of all
highdefinition set-top players sold. At the same time, high definition moviesales for HD DVD reached an all time high for the month of
May, exceeding75,000 movies the last week of May alone.
Overall high definition sales hit a record last week as well,
hitting$5.2 million in actual consumer spending, which was 31% higher than theprevious record for the two formats. This highlights the
growing consumerappetite for HD content across the board.
Sales of dedicated consumer electronics players are a
criticalindicator in the adoption of the high definition formats, given the highattach rates to these players. With the successive price
drops by Toshiba,weekly player sales doubled in April when the price dropped from $499 to$399, doubled again during the first week of the
latest promotion in lateMay, and increased again last week.
While these numbers are impressive, its going to be interesting
to see what happens when Blu-ray backers respond with their own price cuts. If you'd like to read more, Toshiba's entire press release
can be found here.
