Universal Studios announced it will publish both its new and library titles in the Blu-ray disk format, following Toshiba’s withdrawal from the rival HD-DVD standard. The studio has been a strong supporter of the HD-DVD format. Now, we have to wait for other studios to make statements about the future of HD disks. Notably Paramount and Dreamworks, who only last summer committed fully to HD-DVD rather than Blu-ray, after apparently receiving a 150 million dollar bonus from Toshiba (see previous report in Broadband TV News). Meanwhile, Warner Bros announced it will continue to issue titles in both Blu-ray and HD-DVD format until June 2008.
We can conclude that Blu-ray has now won this battle, but we have to wait and see how consumers will react. For the moment, DVD players and the DVDs themselves are at bargain basement prices and we have serious doubts if consumers will be willing to pay premium prices for the Blu-ray product. (See also our recent commentary)
