Chapter 1202 – The fight over members
To set the industry standard, getting recognition is most critical. The more companies using a standard, the faster this standard can be introduced.
This is what happened for DVD standards. DVD Forum has more companies supporting them and let their standard become the industry standard.
Now, both sides are facing off again for the high-definition DVD standards. The Blu-rays DVD Alliance had pulled all the Japanese companies from the DVD forum over to their sides. But at the same time, some DVD Alliance’s members had switched sides to the HD DVD forum.
If those Japanese companies had joined forces because of protectionism, those that left DVD Alliances are because of benefits. Wind and Rain Electronics and Philips had decided to authorize their DVD patents to them. This way, they can produce more popular DVD players, discs, and optical drives.
These companies had to buy the patent authorization rights from those Japanese firms in the DVD Alliance. But with the same price, they will definitely choose the side with a higher value.
Furthermore, DVD Forum has a bigger advantage. BenQ has successfully developed the technology that can play both DVD forum and DVD Alliance’s formats. DVD Alliance’s players can only play their format.
This resulted in DVD Forum getting a big advantage in their DVD players and optical drives. Consumers will not know which format when they buy DVDs. If a player can play all formats, and another player can only play a certain format, what do you think the consumer will choose?
Also, HD DVD Forum had announced that HD DVDs can be produced with the existing DVD production line. This will save costs for those small companies. After all, not every company can afford to invest multi-million to set up new production lines like Sony and Panasonic.
If they do that, how many DVDs must they sell to recover their cost?!
So, many members from both sides switched, and both sides also do their best to attract other electronics companies.
Thompson’s representative represented HD DVD Forum to meet the US movie companies to get their support and asked them not to work with DVD Alliance.
Those Japanese companies immediately responded to this. What’s most important now is those movie companies’ rights. If those movie companies don’t support their format, they will lose out on many movies and affect their profits.
DVD Forum had done this in the past, and the Japanese companies will not allow this to happen again.
Thompson is North America’s top consumer appliance company and had worked with all the movie companies before. This is their biggest advantage.
Of course. Sony has its own movie company, and Toshiba has shares in movie companies. In the end, Sony Pictures and Disney joined the Blu-ray DVD forum, and Japanese firms, like Toei and Toho, had also joined Blu-ray DVD Alliance. Lionsgate, Twentieth Century, MGM, Warner Bros., etc., joined HD DVD Forum. The movie companies in Hong Kong, Taiwan, Korea, and some European also joined the HD DVD faction.
All Chinese movie companies started using HD DVD standards too. After all, all Chinese DVD companies had gotten the patent authorization rights from DVD Forum. They dare not go against Wind and Rain Electronics.
The PC manufacturers are also split into two sides, supporting Blu-rays DVD and HD DVD. But to Feng Yu’s surprise, Intel announced they will be using Blu-rays DVD standard.
This is the same as Microsoft announcing its support for DVD Forum previously. It shocked Philips, Thompson, and other companies.
We are introducing DVD standards, and what has it got to do with Intel? You all are not manufacturing DVD players, optical drives and doesn’t own movie or MV rights! Why are you all interfering?
Microsoft is a software company, and its operating system must support optic drives.
The optical drive port had been standardized a long time ago. Are you going to create a different port? That’s why Feng Yu felt Intel is only trying to create problems and doesn’t need to be bothered by them.
More than 80% of the world’s DVD players are manufactured in China, and Chinese brands own more than 60% of the market share. The remaining 20% is owned by other DVD Forum members, and the other 20% is owned by the DVD Alliance members. These are mainly Japanese brands.
Almost 50% of the world’s DVDs are made in China, and the remaining 30% is from the US. The rest are from Japan, Europe, and other countries.
When it comes to DVD players or discs, China is still the leader, and Wind and Rain Electronics and Aiwa Electronics played a major role.
International electronics firms had acknowledged China is the strongest when it comes to the DVD industry. Only the Japanese companies don’t want to admit it.
This time, DVD Forum is confident of their HD DVD technology is because Wind and Rain Electronics and Aiwa Electronics had started developing this technology two years ago. Sony and the rest of their alliances had only started developing their Blu-rays DVD not long ago.
HD DVD players and the new format discs will be launched in the market soon, and Sony will need at least another year before they can launch their product.
Although the market will not be full when they enter the market, they had let HD DVD gain the upper hand.
During this period, many electronics companies that had never produce DVDs also started to choose sides. Some chose HD DVD Forum, and some chose to join Blu-rays DVD Alliances.
Overall, HD DVD has more members, and more importantly, they have more DVD player manufacturers and movie companies.
But the Japanese companies’ advantage is their HD TVs. Their HD TV technology is the best in the world. If you buy a high-definition DVD player, you must use it with an HD TV.
What’s the point of using a normal TV where you cannot tell the difference between standard and high-definition?
But the Japanese companies did not expect LCD TV technology to develop so fast and overtake plasma TVs. HD TVs can also be made with LCD.
Japanese firms had created technological barriers for their plasma TV technology and made HD DVD more competitive.
When everyone is trying to get more members, Wind and Rain Electronics announced the first HD DVD player’s launch!
Sony and the other companies were dumbfounded. How did they develop the HD DVD so fast? If they have the player, do they have HD DVD discs?
Immediately after the announcement, some Hong Kong movie companies started selling HD DVD movies! The HD era is here!
