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HD-DVD loses format fight
19/02/2008 12:11 - (SA)
Hiroyuki Kachi
Tokyo - Toshiba Corp said on Tuesday that it will discontinue its next-generation DVD business, a move that will likely close the books on what had become one of the consumer electronics industry's biggest format battles.
But in a sign of its determination to bounce back quickly by investing heavily in other business areas, the Japanese electronics company at the same time unveiled a plan to spend more than $15.7bn, to construct two new Nand-type flash memory plants in Japan. The plants are slated to kick off production in 2010.
The new plants will be located in Yokkaichi of central Japan and Kitakami of northern Japan, but details including the monetary value of the investment and monthly production volumes weren't immediately available.
Flash memory is used to store data in lucrative electronic gadgets such as portable music players and cellphones, and is starting to replace hard disk drives in laptop PCs.
The Tokyo-based electronics conglomerate said it will cease research and production of HD-DVD equipment and will stop selling such products around March 31. Toshiba has so far has sold about one million units of HD-DVD equipment worldwide including players and recorders.
The decision underscores almost certain defeat of the HD-DVD format developed by Toshiba to the rival camp, led by Sony Corp, whose DVD players and recorders operate on the Blu-ray Disc standard.
The high-definition DVD market is key for both the movie business and the consumer electronics industry, with sales of players and discs likely to provide a lucrative stream of revenue for years to come. Both Sony and Toshiba have poured significant resources into their efforts to win customers over to their formats.
Sony is part of a Blu-ray consortium that includes Japan's Matsushita Electric Industrial Co and Samsung Electronics Co of South Korea.
In addition to Toshiba, HD-DVD backers include Japan's NEC Corp and Sanyo Electric Co Ltd, as well as Microsoft and Intel Corp.
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