Toshiba to announce HD DVD pullout on Tuesday: report
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Japan's Toshiba Corp (6502.T) will  announce plans to cease production and sales of HD DVD players  on Tuesday, the Nikkei business daily said.
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Japan's Toshiba Corp  waved the white flag in the home movie war, giving up on its HD DVD format after losing the support of key studios and retailers to the Blu-ray technology backed by Sony Corp .
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Toshiba has abandoned the HD DVD high-definition video disc format, it announced Tuesday. (More to fol...
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Sony's Blu-ray looks set to become the standard for high-definition DVDs after Toshiba signalled Monday that it may give up in a long-running format battle, to the relief of investors.
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Ending a multiyear format battle with Sony-backed Blu-ray, Toshiba finally throws in the towel Tuesday, announcing it will no longer manufacture or sell HD DVD equipment.
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Warner Bros., the only major movie studio to release titles on both of the rival high-definition video disc formats, has decided to drop HD DVD and exclusively back Blu-ray Disc, it said Friday.The move could prove decisive in determining which of the two formats becomes the de facto DVD replacement for high-definition content. Currently, both formats are battling to secure a lead, but neither has managed to obtain a meaningful market share due to consumer indifference as a consequence of the battle. As a result, the market for high-definition movies has seen its growth stunted, and companies like Warner have lost potential sales.Warner said the decision was made in part as a response to this situation.&quot;A two-format landscape has led to consumer confusion and indifference toward high definition, which has kept the technology from reaching mass adoption and becoming the important revenue stream that it can be for the industry,&quot; said Kevin Tsujihara, president of Warner&#39;s home entertainment group in a statement.The move comes on the eve of the Consumer Electronics Show, which kicks off on Monday in Las Vegas, and is sure to light a fire under the HD DVD camp, which is chiefly backed by Toshiba and also includes Paramount, Universal, HBO Video, Microsoft, and Intel. The HD DVD Promotion Group has a previously scheduled news conference on Sunday, and the rival Blu-ray Disc group is scheduled to speak the following day.Companies from both sides of the format battle are expected to show their latest players and talk up their own formats during CES.Last year&#39;s CES saw the unveiling by Warner of a hybrid disc called Total HD. The disc attempted to break the format deadlock by offering one side compatible with HD DVD and the other side compatible with Blu-ray Disc. However, the disc never made it to market, and Warner gave up on the hybrid format later in 2007.
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Japan's Toshiba is considering abandoning its HD DVD format for high definition DVDs, as it is losing the battle for market dominance against rival Sony's Blu-ray format, an industry source said Monday.
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General Electric Co's   Universal Pictures, one of a few studios using the Toshiba  Corp-backed (6502.T) HD DVD format, said on Tuesday it will  switch to the rival Blu-ray format now that Toshiba has  officially pulled the plug on HD DVD.
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Toshiba has abandoned the HD DVD high-definition video disc format, it announced Tuesday.
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Japan's Toshiba Corp  said it will brief on its HD DVD business and its new NAND flash memory plants at 3 a.m. EST.
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November 29, 2004 - After months of momentum for Blu-ray, HD-DVD has shot back with a big gain - studio support. Toshiba Corp., which has been developing the HD-DVD format, announced it has lined up Warner Bros.
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Microsoft shrugged off HD DVD&#39;s demise on Tuesday, declining to say if or when it would support Blu-ray Disc for the Xbox.Microsoft steadfastly backed HD DVD, selling an external drive for the Xbox for $129.99. That offer was still on the U.S. Xbox Web site as of Tuesday, despite the news that&#160;Toshiba will scuttle the format. Toshiba had been the lead electronics manufacturer in a coalition of companies pushing that format but content producers have thrown their support to Blu-ray.Microsoft&#39;s decision to make the HD DVD drive external rather than within the console &quot;was quite a strategic move on their part,&quot; said Paul O&#39;Donovan, principal analyst with Gartner.However, it&#39;s inevitable that future Xbox versions, as well as other gaming systems aimed at tighter integration with entertainment systems, will incorporate Blu-ray Disc drives, said O&#39;Donovan. The Xbox currently has a standard DVD drive.Sony gained momentum for its Blu-ray player by putting it in its PlayStation 3 console, according to research company IDC.The PS3&#39;s &quot;dual roles as a gaming console and a next-generation DVD player have made it an important part of the format war,&quot; according to the report.Prior to Toshiba&#39;s announcement, Microsoft downplayed the rumors of HD DVD&#39;s death, contending buyers are more interested in gaming functions.&quot;We do not believe the recent reports about HD DVD will have any material impact on the Xbox 360 platform or our position in the marketplace,&quot; the company said in a statement. &quot;It is premature to speculate but we do know from market data that HD movie playback is not a primary purchase driver for consumers buying video game consoles.&quot;Microsoft, which started selling the external drive for $199 in late 2006, has dropped the price twice, to $179 last August finally to its current price, which varies by region.O&#39;Donovan agreed the company likely won&#39;t face declining sales of its Xbox gaming console. But Microsoft&#39;s greater problem may be getting rid of the external HD DVD drives in its inventory.HD DVD is &quot;dead and gone&quot; now, O&#39;Donovan said.&#160;
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Toshiba Corp is planning to give up on  its HD DVD format for high definition DVDs, conceding defeat to  the competing Blu-Ray technology backed by Sony Corp, a company  source said on Saturday.
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Japan's Toshiba Corp  waved the  white flag in the home movie war, giving up on its HD DVD  format after losing the support of key studios and retailers to  the Blu-ray technology backed by Sony Corp .
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Toshiba Corp. said on Monday it had won support for the HD DVD optical disc standard from Warner Bros. Studios, Paramount Pictures, Universal Pictures
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Toshiba Corp. will unveil in Taipei on Tuesday a slim HD DVD rewriter suitable for use in laptop computers.
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Shares of Toshiba Corp jumped 5 percent on Monday as analysts applauded the company's expected move to abandon its HD DVD format, leaving Blu-ray technology backed by Sony Corp to become the standard for the next-generation DVD.