The market for HDTV has hit the mainstream in the US and Asia-Pacific, while in Europe it is gaining momentum. Now, the industry has started speculating about the commercialization of Ultra-High Definition (UHD).
Market research firm In-Stat believes there will be a lengthy time period before the UHD market reaches a critical mass of 5% household penetration. However, as the initial market debuts over the next five to ten years, there will be ample opportunities for technology companies, manufacturers, service providers and media companies to experiment with business models and strategies to make UHD a strong business in the long term.
“UHD formats provide between four and 16 times the resolution of Blu-ray or 1080p high definition, as well as 22.2 multichannel three-dimensional sound,” said Michelle Abraham, In-Stat analyst, in a statement. “This is a vast improvement over the currently available end user viewing experience in the home.”
As originally proposed, UHD comes in two levels of resolution: 7680 x 4320 pixels (i.e., 8K resolution), and 3840 x 2160 (i.e., 4K resolution).
Recent research by In-Stat found the following:
The rising popularity of high resolution digital cinema will expose consumers to high resolution content. Then, early UHDTVs will be made available to provide a digital cinema high resolution viewing experience in the home. Ultimately, broadcasters will start offering UHD content to an addressable market of UHDTVs, between 2017 and 2022.
In-Stat expects the total installed base of UHDTVs Europe to approach 5% household penetration until 2021, and increase to over 28.2% penetration by 2025. In Asia-Pacific, Japan will be among the early adopter countries.
