Wedbush Morgan Securities analyst picks Blu-Ray to win by next year!

[shug7272]

Despite the public perception of Sony’s folly, the console is selling well without a true blockbuster title, and the marquee games will come in time. Pachter sees the console’s future as being bright. “A year from now we’ll all be laughing because the PS3 will have a price cut, Blu-Ray will be the standard high-definition movie format, an there will be a lot of software for the box.”


Source is a Game Informer article. Heres a copy.

http://ps3forums.com/showthread.php?t=81513

[Aaron]

Originally Posted by nyg

Another analyst gets it right. I too expect a solid Blu-ray victory within 12-18 months.

Same here.

[jedisinclair]

Amen!

[JTK]

I expect this holiday season to at least unofficially ice it for Blu-Ray once and for all.

[BTBuck1]

Working at BB I am starting to really see sales of ps3 pick up. And we can't keep the bdps300 in stock! The Firesale of Toshiba HDDVD players seemed to make no dent at all (atleast in my location).
it is becoming a daily event now seeing random customers walking around with BD's in their hand, when before it was the same few people.

This is great news for HDDVD!

[WickyWoo]

Personally I've found most of the analysts useless because 95% of them only concentrate on the next quarter when they give advice. There's no real study of entertainment trends or analysis, it's all based on what they did in the last half year.

[dialog_gvf]

Originally Posted by BTBuck1

Working at BB I am starting to really see sales of ps3 pick up. And we can't keep the bdps300 in stock! The Firesale of Toshiba HDDVD players seemed to make no dent at all (atleast in my location).
it is becoming a daily event now seeing random customers walking around with BD's in their hand, when before it was the same few people.

This is great news for HDDVD!

Cool. The BDP-S300 may have hit a key brand/price point, I think. Sony (despite the constant slander) is far more respected by the masses than Toshiba.

We're looking to move into the general adoption phase (mass adoption won't happen for several more years), and a nice under $500 Sony player seems to be just the ticket.

If they lower that to under $400 (SRP) by Black Friday, they will fly off the shelves in Q4. As will the PS/3s.

Gary

[BillCable]

Retailers would be stupid to allow this format war to last through the holiday season. As long as there is doubt, most people will be afraid to jump in. If retailers erase all doubt by ditching HD-DVD completely before Halloween, then they'll have a flood of people buying into the new hotness this Christmas. They stand to make a billion extra dollars if they're decisive.

[GTP]

Originally Posted by BillCable

Retailers would be stupid to allow this format war to last through the holiday season. As long as there is doubt, most people will be afraid to jump in. If retailers erase all doubt by ditching HD-DVD completely before Halloween, then they'll have a flood of people buying into the new hotness this Christmas. They stand to make a billion extra dollars if they're decisive.

Agreed...I see BB going BD only by that point if not sooner, but maybe I am giving them far too much credit.

[Sylin]

The writing is on the proverbial wall for HD-DVD already. I personally was unsure of who was going to "win" the format war until last month when Toshiba announced they were going to miss their HD-DVD player sales projections by a whopping 60%. Having a former electronics manufacturing background, I know that is HUGE... probably a bigger statement than most consumers realize. It's one thing to miss projections by 10-20%... but if you are only taking in 40% of your projected sales, that means your product's days are numbered.

After I read that article, I started buying BD movies in the hopes of getting a great Gen2 player this summer. (Now if only CC would stock the new Panny so I can use my gift cards...)

Universal seems allied with Toshiba only on a sort of good-faith agreement, but that is soon to lapse. Universal Music is already neutral. It's only a matter of time now before everyone is on-board with Blu-ray.

My personal projection is that by the end of the summer (Aug/Sept) we'll see Toshiba announce some sort of cut-back or informal resignation from HD-DVD technology. Companies may continue to release neutral discs or hybrid ones for a while, but BD will be the "hot" thing this Xmas.

[nhaase]

Originally Posted by JTK

I expect this holiday season to at least unofficially ice it for Blu-Ray once and for all.

After the holiday season the format war will be like the aftermath of the first battle in 300, where Leonidus (spelling?) is discussing his next move while Spartans in the background spear the wounded.

[reiella]

Ya know, seeing these posts reminds me why I had a subscribtion to Game Informer.

Not necessarily that they're less biased or whatever, they're just more biased towards my tastes

[dialog_gvf]

Originally Posted by ikcizokm

The writing is on the proverbial wall for HD-DVD already. I personally was unsure of who was going to "win" the format war until last month when Toshiba announced they were going to miss their HD-DVD player sales projections by a whopping 60%. Having a former electronics manufacturing background, I know that is HUGE... probably a bigger statement than most consumers realize. It's one thing to miss projections by 10-20%... but if you are only taking in 40% of your projected sales, that means your product's days are numbered.

Toshiba are still predicting 1 million HD DVD this year, with about 100K sold in the first half of this year.

Anybody see a problem with the updated projections?

Gary

[What'sHD]

Can BDA offer some goodies to Uni or even apply some 'gentle' leverage on them?

Say, Sony/Panasonic offer 'cheap' AVC encodes for Uni's top titles for release on BD... OR make it clear that if they delay support too long, no encoding help will be forthcoming, ever.


If hd-dvd dies, I presume MS will stop helping so much with VC1 encodes. Uni is gonna want some help then and they would be wise to lock it in sooner rather than later.

[desmond]

sony needs to release spiderman at least four weeks before black friday in order to complete annihilate hd-dvd sales. nothing says dead format like 10% market share.

[Ascended_Saiyan]

Originally Posted by FUHNAHTIK

Sometimes folks are smart enough to make up their own mind.

True, but unfortunately it doesn't seem to happen often. Plus, store can't push their HD players with two different formats. To sell one over the other leaves them holding the bag with one of format players. That's not a good situation for a retailer to be in. That's why some of the major retailers in Australia are carrying BD players only.

[LeoneFan]

Originally Posted by FUHNAHTIK

how would you stand to make money by isolating yourself during a period such as this? The only person making money off that would be a store down the street still offering their consumer a choice. Sometimes folks are smart enough to make up their own mind.

Well, those who bought into HDDVD weren't a real intelligent bunch so you can't put too much faith in people.

[stockstar1138]

Originally Posted by FUHNAHTIK

how would you stand to make money by isolating yourself during a period such as this? The only person making money off that would be a store down the street still offering their consumer a choice. Sometimes folks are smart enough to make up their own mind.

well first off, since the cut in prices HD DVD players have zero margin profits for stores. An employee of a big box retailer posted a story on eproductwars about it. Second, the longer people don't take sides, the longer they have to wait for the big $. Masses wont buy in until after the war is over, people need to take sides and get this over with.

[BillCable]

Originally Posted by FUHNAHTIK

how would you stand to make money by isolating yourself during a period such as this? The only person making money off that would be a store down the street still offering their consumer a choice. Sometimes folks are smart enough to make up their own mind.

The choice has been made already, buddy. Sorry to break the news to you.

It's really very simple. People see Blu-ray and HD-DVD on the shelves, they think a war's going on and won't buy either. People see just Blu-ray, they know Blu-ray has won, and they buy it. Retailers make billions.

[richteer]

Originally Posted by FUHNAHTIK

how would you stand to make money by isolating yourself during a period such as this? The only person making money off that would be a store down the street still offering their consumer a choice. Sometimes folks are smart enough to make up their own mind.

I respectfully disagree. The format war has served its purpose: HW prices have come down much more quickly than they would have without the war. But it's time to end market confusion for J6P by ending the war NOW (or at least, in time for the Xmas shopping season). Given a choice, most people will just wait. The complete and utter failure of SACD or DVD-A to replace CD for exactly the same reasons is proof of this. The next-gen audio format war went on for too long, thereby effectively killing both alternatives. If the industry isn't careful the same'll happen to HD video.

As others have said, more retailers need to stop sitting on the fence and pick a side. I think most of us here would agree that Blu-ray would be the correct side to pick! :-)