What if Sony approached Toshiba or Microsoft and offerred to pay them a bajillion dollars for the rights to HD DVD in payment for them to support Blu-ray? Toshiba's happy because they get the money and they can now start making Blu-ray players; Sony is happy because HD DVD is gone and they can move forward. The new Blu-ray players would be able to play existing HD DVDs, and the studios could release the movie on either a BD or HD DVD disc depending on the situation - but the public would never know. The new product could be marketed as Blu-ray High Definition Digital Versitile Disc (BD-HDDVD).

A bajillion dollars. Is that market value or an earnings estimate appraisal? :rolleyes:

Seriously though, at the pace both high-def media formats are selling I wouldn't be surprised if Sony could buy HD-DVD for... ohh, a couple of million bucks. ;)

Too big of a what if to discuss. The result would be the endo of the format war immediately. But that scenario is a big fantasy.

This offer was rejected when the format unification talk failed in 2005, so no "what if" or whatever to discuss about this old topic.

Toshiba would save a ton of money. They wouldn't have to worry about a finalized spec and could greatly simplify the design. JK :)

Now, while we're dreaming, I would love seeing a 51Gb purple (HD-DVD and blu-ray combined) Toshiba player. At that point, there wouldn't be any downside. You'd have access to all studios, and you'd have a fully functional player.

I think somebody else should just invest a bajillion dollars and create holographic media that holds 10X as much for $10 title and sell the players for $50 a pop. That would end the war. Yeah.

I've always wondered if Sony would sort-of buy out Microsoft by offering to use VC-1, at least to a greater degree in order to get them to stop supporting HD-DVD financially.

Too big of a what if to discuss. The result would be the endo of the format war immediately. But that scenario is a big fantasy.

A fantasy like the scenario that price doesn't matter to consumers?

I'd be all for Sony buying out or merging with HD-DVD as long as they required all future BD players to be made HD-DVD playback capable.

I'd think you would sooner see Microsoft buy out Sony, lock stock and barrel. Then announce the conversion of Blu Ray to HD DVD.

Hell, I would guess Bill Gates could write a personal check to buy Sony. God knows he has the cash...

I'd think you would sooner see Microsoft buy out Sony, lock stock and barrel. Then announce the conversion of Blu Ray to HD DVD.

Hell, I would guess Bill Gates could write a personal check to buy Sony. God knows he has the cash...

While Sony has their bright spots, as a corporation they are in shambles and only a hollow shell of what Sony was like in the 1980's and early 1990's.

Who in their right mind would buy Sony?

What if it never rains again and all the ground dries up and we also turn to dust..

What if we all had jet packs

What if we all could hop like frogs would I be better at basketball that LeBron James?

What if Star Wars was real

What if people never asked bs questions?

What if I could see dead people

What if...

What if it never rains again and all the ground dries up and we also turn to dust..

What if we all had jet packs

What if we all could hop like frogs would I be better at basketball that LeBron James?

What if Star Wars was real

What if people never asked bs questions?

What if I could see dead people

What if...

Star Wars isn't real????

What if Sony approached Toshiba or Microsoft and offerred to pay them a bajillion dollars for the rights to HD DVD in payment for them to support Blu-ray? Toshiba's happy because they get the money and they can now start making Blu-ray players; Sony is happy because HD DVD is gone and they can move forward. The new Blu-ray players would be able to play existing HD DVDs, and the studios could release the movie on either a BD or HD DVD disc depending on the situation - but the public would never know. The new product could be marketed as Blu-ray High Definition Digital Versitile Disc (BD-HDDVD).

It wouldn't surprise me if Sony tried. The MiniDisc, UMD, Memory Stick, BetaMax, ATRAC, SACD failures left Sony permanently scarred and they are going to slash and burn everything to get Blu-Ray into the mainstream. Sony will run their company into bankruptcy to get Blu-Ray out there.

Sony will run their company into bankruptcy to get Blu-Ray out there.


Riiiight.

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Toshiba in a better financial position to "buy out" Blu-Ray than Sony is to "buy out" HD DVD?

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Toshiba in a better financial position to "buy out" Blu-Ray than Sony is to "buy out" HD DVD?

Toshiba's Market Cap = about $25B
Sony's Market Cap = about $54B

You tell me.

What if Sony approached Toshiba or Microsoft and offerred to pay them a bajillion dollars for the rights to HD DVD in payment for them to support Blu-ray? Toshiba's happy because they get the money and they can now start making Blu-ray players; Sony is happy because HD DVD is gone and they can move forward. The new Blu-ray players would be able to play existing HD DVDs, and the studios could release the movie on either a BD or HD DVD disc depending on the situation - but the public would never know. The new product could be marketed as Blu-ray High Definition Digital Versitile Disc (BD-HDDVD).

Why would you want to buy out the competition just to release a combo player? They can do that already without having to "buy" anyone.

If they're going to pay a brazillion dollars to secure HDDVD technology it will be so they can eliminate it from the market thus allow the PS3 secure it's place in your home.

But it's not going to happen.

Honestly, I think HD-DVD has established itself enough that if Blu-Ray wanted to buy out HD-DVD, there could be some anti-trust violations. Not that it matters or would ever happen anyway.

Too big of a what if to discuss. The result would be the end of the format war immediately.

Versus it taking a few more months. :p

Toshiba's Market Cap = about $25B
Sony's Market Cap = about $54B

You tell me.
Small fish can and does swallow big fish :) Remember WorldCom and MCI ?
Didn't realize both companies are much smaller (market cap wise) than they seem to be.

Small fish can and does swallow big fish :) Remember WorldCom and MCI ?
Didn't realize both companies are much smaller (market cap wise) than they seem to be.

Very true. But the question was which was in a better financial position to buy, my money is on the bigger fish in that test.

Moot point, since there will be no buyouts anyways.

What if Sony approached Toshiba or Microsoft and offerred to pay them a bajillion dollars for the rights to HD DVD in payment for them to support Blu-ray?Why would Sony do that instead of approaching Universal and the Weinsteins and offering them less money than that to go neutral? I know Universal is part of GE, but I see no reason to believe that whatever payoff amounts would be required would be anywhere near as high for them as for Toshiba or Microsoft. It wouldn't be quite the same as bringing an abrupt halt to the format war, but might be the beginning of the end. And it looks like payoffs for non-exclusive support can be done in completely legal ways.

--Darin

Why would Sony do that instead of approaching Universal and the Weinsteins and offering them less money than that to go neutral? I know Universal is part of GE, but I see no reason to believe that whatever payoff amounts would be required would be anywhere near as high for them as for Toshiba or Microsoft. It wouldn't be quite the same as bringing an abrupt halt to the format war, but might be the beginning of the end. And it looks like payoffs for non-exclusive support can be done in completely legal ways.

--Darin

Well, they'd have to pay Warner a lot of money as well to release their movies sans IME on BD and to stop favoring HD-DVD so heavily.

And they'd have to pay us consumers to scoop up their non-final-spec BD machines that are being sold at extortion prices.

Toshiba's Market Cap = about $25B
Sony's Market Cap = about $54B

You tell me.


Isn't Microsoft's market cap something like $200B?

Isn't Microsoft's market cap something like $200B?

MICROSOFT CP (NasdaqGS:MSFT)

After Hours: 29.86 0.01 (0.03%) as of Jun 12 on 06/12/07

Last Trade: 29.85
Trade Time: Jun 12
Change: 0.17 (0.57%)
Prev Close: 30.02
Open: 29.95
Bid: 29.00 x 2000
Ask: 30.83 x 2000
1y Target Est: 34.00

Day's Range: 29.77 - 30.24
52wk Range: 21.46 - 31.48
Volume: 56,981,841
Avg Vol (3m): 53,660,400
Market Cap: 285.57B

MS could buy Sony with the loose change in their pocket.

HD-A2 was $499 before all the rebates started.
Did you consider that extortion?

Almost noone paid $499 for an A2 because even at the initial launch there was enough profit in the unit for dealers to discount it... additionally the first $100 "price drop" happened within just a couple of months of launch, and now we've seen the price drop even further to $299 which appears to really be driving some big sales numbers.

PS3 is sold at virtually zero profit (retailers agree to this hoping to make their money back on accessory and game sales) and there is nowhere to cut the prices unless it comes direct from Sony.

"Extortion" = the practice of obtaining something, esp. money, through force or threats.

If you don't want a BD player, don't buy one.

That said, a lot of people paid $499 for their HD-A1's and praised it's "cheapness" compared to the BD-P1000.

Why do I get the feeling that a $99 Blu-ray player with profile 1.1, analog outputs, TrueHD, DTS:HD MA support and 1080p/24 would be "too expensive" as long as there was a 1080i, non-analog output HD-DVD player for $89.


When that BD player becomes available (or any player for $299 or less) make sure you update this thread.

HD-DVD is at $299 today, with many retailers selling at $250'ish. Toshiba has said sales are increasing dramatically at these prices.

How long do you think it's going to be before we see BD players at those prices from name brand companies?

You can dredge up past prices all you want, but what is affecting things is pricing as it is today

Sony barely can buy anything, not a nother format - it is bleeding money so badly at an unthinkable level...

Toshiba's Market Cap = about $25B
Sony's Market Cap = about $54B

You tell me.

Microsoft's market cap = $287 billion as of fifteen minutes ago. They could buy out Sony and Toshiba and come back for thirds. :p

On the point of this thread, though, Sony's nowhere near a position to buy out anyone these days, at least not a company of Toshiba's stature. Their gaming unit is hemorrhaging money, and their business overall is in a state of decline. They need to straighten out their own corporation before they can begin to think about others.

I think somebody else should just invest a bajillion dollars and create holographic media that holds 10X as much for $10 title and sell the players for $50 a pop. That would end the war. Yeah.


that would end the war in Iraq as well. ;)

For a bajillion dollars Sony could probably get the Toshiba’s DVD patents in the bargain.
Then Toshiba could use the money to buy a stake in SanDisk and together with them
bake 2-4 “Extreme IV Compact Flash” cards into a piece of plastic and we would have a much smarter physical media for the future than this “ol’ skool” spinning discs and moving mechanics.
HD/BD is really a clumsy technology that has come to late as formats for the future. Today we have flashmemory cards that have no moving parts and are as big as a postage stamp and even 8GB micro cards smaller than your thumbs nail.

If this was tooled for HD movie distribution, the technology is available today and could be created “within months”. The factories are there. “Standalone “ players could be based on Toshiba’s laptop design.
Available today:
Extreme III 16GB read/write 20mbs.
Extreme IV 8GB read/write 40mbs.
How long will it take before Extreme IV will available in 16GB, 6 months?
Two 16GB Extreme IV cards combined will already exceed HD DVD capacity, 4 will exceed BD capacity.
Use the HD DVD standard features specs. like HDi etc. Then there is no reason to waste time on long discussions about features. Make 25% of the Card read/write many, for storage of downloadable material belonging to the movie.
They are extremely reliable and they don’t skip, they don’t freeze, they don’t scratch etc.
How hard can it be?

No one in their right mind would have gone through all the problems and costs of creating spinning disks and mechanics today if they had started development of a physical media for the future.

It’s really ironic to see two technologies that have already passed their
“Technological Expiring Date” competes to become a format of the future.

Puuh! Then I got that off my chest. :)

Market cap is hardly the end all and be all of a businesses power, as the company can't utilize that to purchase competitors, etc. Market cap is really a way to show how much stock there is and vaguely show the size of a company. Also don't ignore that SNE is on NYSE and MSFT on Nasdaq.

Look at a company's financials, say on Yahoo Finance:


SNE 54.63
PERIOD ENDING 31-Mar-06 31-Mar-05 31-Mar-04
Total Revenue 63,541,206 66,584,429 71,215,715
Cost of Revenue 43,786,875 50,988,998 48,052,948

MSFT 30.14
PERIOD ENDING 30-Jun-06 30-Jun-05 30-Jun-04
Total Revenue 44,282,000 39,788,000 36,835,000
Cost of Revenue 7,650,000 6,200,000 6,716,000




Microsoft of course, has much more cash on hand and higher profitability, but their budget volume is much much smaller, as are the tangible assets. Sony is past the nadir of their expense on the PS3 and it will only get better from the 07 lows, which is why their stock has been steadily increasing.

When that BD player becomes available (or any player for $299 or less) make sure you update this thread.

HD-DVD is at $299 today, with many retailers selling at $250'ish. Toshiba has said sales are increasing dramatically at these prices.

How long do you think it's going to be before we see BD players at those prices from name brand companies?

6 months.

5 months, more likely (most likely around Black Friday through Christmas). ;)

Well, it took a year for MSRP to come down 50% for Blu-ray.

At $299, which is under the MSRP via the rebate, HD-DVD prices have only fallen 40%.

With that said, I don't think it'll be long before we see $299 BD players. Sony themselves have said that they intend the S300 to be between $299 and $399 by Christmas... and Sony is, of course, a classically much more expensive brand.

I do find it interesting you use the words "name brand companies". A lot of people are suggesting the game will change when the "no name chinese" HD-DVD players arrive.

Do you not consider those players to be of value?

I think that "no name" players do have a place in the market and might drive adoption for either format. The cheaper you get though the "cheaper" you get.

In other words, if a consumer has a choice between a "no name" BD player for $249 and a "no name" HD DVD player for $149, which will they choose? Is the movie selection and "Blu-Ray" brand name strong enough to suck an extra $100 out of the pocket of your typical big box shopper?

I do think that brand name has some influence in consumer electronics purchases. People might spend an extra $50 for a Toshiba or Sony product, but will they spend $100? $200 more?

Is Sony subsidizing their new BD players? If they are then their CE partners cannot be happy as they were told that a slow sales curve would allow them to sell players at great margins for years, similar to what happened with DVD.

For a bajillion dollars Sony could probably get the Toshiba’s DVD patents in the bargain.
Then Toshiba could use the money to buy a stake in SanDisk and together with them
bake 2-4 “Extreme IV Compact Flash” cards into a piece of plastic and we would have a much smarter physical media for the future than this “ol’ skool” spinning discs and moving mechanics.
HD/BD is really a clumsy technology that has come to late as formats for the future. Today we have flashmemory cards that have no moving parts and are as big as a postage stamp and even 8GB micro cards smaller than your thumbs nail.

If this was tooled for HD movie distribution, the technology is available today and could be created “within months”. The factories are there. “Standalone “ players could be based on Toshiba’s laptop design.
Available today:
Extreme III 16GB read/write 20mbs.
Extreme IV 8GB read/write 40mbs.
How long will it take before Extreme IV will available in 16GB, 6 months?
Two 16GB Extreme IV cards combined will already exceed HD DVD capacity, 4 will exceed BD capacity.
Use the HD DVD standard features specs. like HDi etc. Then there is no reason to waste time on long discussions about features. Make 25% of the Card read/write many, for storage of downloadable material belonging to the movie.
They are extremely reliable and they don’t skip, they don’t freeze, they don’t scratch etc.
How hard can it be?

No one in their right mind would have gone through all the problems and costs of creating spinning disks and mechanics today if they had started development of a physical media for the future.

It’s really ironic to see two technologies that have already passed their
“Technological Expiring Date” competes to become a format of the future.

Puuh! Then I got that off my chest. :)The problem with distributing media on flash cards is price. A BD costs about a dollar to produce in bulk, an HD DVD about $0.60 or so. A 30GB flash card would be significantly more, even if they somehow created a cheaper read only type of non-volatile memory that could somehow be stamped at speed, I would still bet it would be a lot more expensive. 4GB today would probably cost you about $15 - $20 in bulk, if not more.

A 30GB flash card would be significantly more, even if they somehow created a cheaper read only type of non-volatile memory that could somehow be stamped at speed ...I don't know what they'll come up with, but that point about stamping at speed is a good one. Even free media isn't low cost enough if it is too expensive to get the data on there.

--Darin