It was the HD DVD crowd that got on the offensive the last two weeks, starting in Europe and followed by strikes against Blu-ray in the States. The HD DVD message can be summed up as claiming significant increases in the sales of HD DVD hardware and content.
HD DVD video players have outsold Blu-ray players so far this year by a three-to-one margin in Britain, Germany and France, according to the European HD DVD Promotional Group, which said it had a 74% market share in Britain, Germany, France, Italy, Spain and Switzerland for standalone players. The count does not include the HD DVD drives that go into PCs or videogame consoles such as the Blu-ray drive that’s standard in PS3s or the optional HD DVD drive for Xbox 360s.
The group said it was using figures from market research company GfK, but GfK told Reuters that it has not published research commissioned from the trade group. The European HD DVD Promotional Group would not say how many units have been shipped to European retailers.
Toshiba sells its entry-level HD DVD player for $549 in Europe and $299 in the States.
Olivier Van Wynendaele, Toshiba’s spokesman for the European HD DVD group, told Reuters that profit margins for its HD DVD players were comparable to those for its DVD players in Europe. However, he would not say whether Toshiba was selling HD DVD players at a loss in the United States.
Overall, HD DVD hardware sales were claimed to be up 37% from Q1 to Q2, while sales of movies on HD DVD discs were up 20%, according to a statement from North American HD DVD Promotional Group at the Entertainment Merchants Association (EMA) Home Media Expo 2007 in Las Vegas. The group said the data is based on reports from NPD and Nielsen//NetRatings as well as point of sale data from the studios.
During the same time frame, the group said, overall Blu-ray hardware sales declined 27% and movie sales on Blu-ray discs declined 5%. It did not say whether hardware sales included PS3 or the add-on drive for the Xbox 360.
The group said growth came from major spring marketing efforts and the drop in price of standalone HD DVD players to as low as $299.
There are currently only 180,000 dedicated HD DVD players in the market, the group said. That seems to exclude HD DVD drives in PCs and those that Microsoft sells as an option to the Xbox 360.
“The numbers are clear – HD DVD is steadily gaining momentum and market share,” said Ken Graffeo, executive VP of HD strategic marketing for Universal Studios Home Entertainment, and co-president of the HD DVD Promotional Group. “With HD DVD CE players now at suggested starting prices of $299 and with strong marketing campaigns around new HD DVD titles with Web-enabled interactive features, we’re continuing to raise the bar for the consumer experience.”
The group said that most consumers base their purchasing decisions on pricing.
“With the total number of titles available for each format differing by only 20 titles to 30 titles at this time, the real-world gap in content between the two formats is in actuality not as large as many would perceive,” said Paul Erickson, a market analyst with IMS Research. “Consumers in the US and Europe continue to show the greatest sensitivity to price, rather than content or branding, in their purchase decision for standalone high-definition players.”
According to the HD DVD Promotional Group, titles like “300,” coming later this month from Warner Home Video, and “Heroes: Season 1,” coming in August from Universal Studios Home Entertainment, means that HD DVD owners worldwide will have nearly 1,000 titles to choose from by the start of the holiday shopping season. However it is worth pointing out that all of these numbers disagree with prior published numbers from the Blu-ray side of the argument