Jul 27 2009, 02:34 PM, updated 17y ago
Even though the future is Blue in most parts of the word, in appears as though government sponsored China is going red. Guess what that translate to Malaysian market? Another VCD scenario?
CBHD Leads Market Share over Blu-ray in China
That new HD format launched in China earlier this year has already overtaken the Blu-ray format. This can’t be sitting well with the Blu-ray crew considering the size of the Chinese market and the fact the CBHD only has one studio behind it.
CBHD seems to be doing much better against rival Blu-ray than its ill fated predecessor HD DVD. A recent report by a Japanese news station looking at CBHD format and its competition with Blu-ray confirms CBHD has a 3% market share lead on Blu-ray. The CBHD format launched in the first half of 2009, Blu-ray launched in China mid 2008.
http://www.engadgethd.com/2009/07/25/blu-r...ond-theater-of/
Just because Toshiba has given up on HD DVD and moved on, doesn't mean the format war is totally over for red. According to a report by a Japanese TV station, its successor, China Blue HD is actually leading Blu-ray in marketshare in that country. Of course, based on the article found by our friends at FormatWarCentral, all we have to go on is a machine translated description of a video in a language we don't speak describing the apparent initial success of the government backed format in a socialist republic. If you need more evidence than that to declare the format war officially restarted, you're probably a communist, but before we drag you in front of the Un-American activities committee check out the video for a peek at the slick new CBHD cases that The Onion will surely be shipping its videos in very soon.
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http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/busi...icle6732410.ece
edited: not 3% but 3 to 1 player
China has unleashed a new “format war” for control of the high-definition DVD market in an audacious attempt to unseat the Blu-ray disc as the sole global standard.
The launch of the China Blue High-definition Disc (CBHD) for domestic use is viewed by analysts as a dramatic assertion of the country’s rising technological confidence and they believe that the format could mount a serious challenge to Blu-ray.
China’s gambit comes just 18 months after the Blu-ray Disc consortium — a 100-strong group of technology and media companies led by Sony — declared victory over the similarly sized HD-DVD Forum led by Toshiba. Warner Bros, whose support for Blu-ray was the deciding factor during the 2008 war, has said it will support the new format as the technology finds its feet.
The potential growth of the format in China has already become clear. In just a couple of months since it was launched, the cheaper all-Chinese CBHD players are thought to be outselling Blu-ray players at a rate of about three to one. The discs, priced at 50 yuan (£4.50), set consumers back about a quarter of the cost of a Blu-ray.
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Toshiba’s defeat last year followed a marketing showdown, allegations of giant payoffs and dirty tricks and an all-out charm offensive to win the support of the Hollywood studios. The sudden capitulation by HD-DVD cut short what might have been a long and expensive campaign in the VHS/Betamax mould.
But the sudden emergence of the CBHD this year has shattered the peace. Atul Goyal, technology analyst at CLSA, said: “You are looking at a technology that comes with the backing of the Chinese Government and has the power to win the support of the big studios if they sense it is a way to make money in China. Everyone thought the format war was dead, but it is clearly still alive.”
Toshiba confirmed that the CBHD format was based largely on technology developed for HD-DVDs and that it was “in a licensor-licensee relationship”.
China’s decision to back the new format — the Government owns the critical software — is understood to arise from a desire to protect its electronics industry from the royalty costs of using technology developed overseas. Chinese makers of ordinary DVD players have to pay about $22 per machine in royalty costs to a variety of patent holders; the dominance of Blu-ray would have condemned them to many more years of payments as that technology grew in market share.
The creation of a “home grown” format will fatten the margins of Chinese technology groups as Beijing pushes them to become internationally competitive.
From the perspective of Hollywood studios, meanwhile, the sale of movies on a cheap format may temporarily counteract the damage done by piracy.
CBHD was initially expected to flex its muscles as a format in China alone. Warner Bros has said that 100 titles will appear on the format by the end of this year and about 30 are already available.
But at least one other big Hollywood studio is understood to be considering support for CBHD, suggesting to some that it may creep out from China into neighbouring markets. CBHD players are available in Hong Kong and the cheaper format may prove attractive in other emerging markets in the region.
Although analysts believe that high- definition disc technology will only be a stopgap until the era of 100 per cent downloaded content, others believe that that time could be at least a decade away.
This post has been edited by g5sim: Jul 30 2009, 06:05 AM
Officially launched 2009, CBHD already leading BD, in China by 3 to 1. BD launched in 2008
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