July 15, 2008

NEC Hints At Mass Blu-ray Player Price Drops In The Near Future

BD-UP5000_overhead(2).jpg Japan's NEC Corp. seem to be throwing themselves into the Blu-ray market with force, announcing they expect to double sales of its own Blu-ray products in the next couple of years. And not necessarily because Blu-ray is guaranteed to double in popularity, but because they plan to bring down the price of Blu-ray players thanks to their new BD Live-capable superchip. NEC forecasts that they'll own 40% of the Blu-ray chip market by March 2009, and grow that market share to over half by March 2011. With the new superchip pretty much guaranteed to bring down manufacturing costs of Blu-ray players, and trickling its way down the supply chain to result in cheaper Blu-ray players for us, NEC expects sales of about $378 million in the Blu-ray category by March 2011. The real question is whether or not NEC's new chip and competing superchips such as Panasonic's UniPhier will bring Blu-ray player prices below the $200 mark anytime soon. Until then, Blu-ray will remain nothing more than a niche product bought by only the most dedicated home theater fanatics.

Via Reuters