[greenland]

Is this the beginning of the end for Pioneer in the HDTV market?


I can understand if they did not have the new Panasonic glass yet available for to assemble Demo models of their next Plasma models, but they surely have no such excuse for not being able to demostrate their LCD Kuro models, since they get the panels from Sharp, their partner.


It is starting to look like Pioneer may be slow walking away from the HDTV business.

 

[chadmak09]

I don't think Pioneer is going anywhere.



But still..........................................

 

[Fanaticalism]

There have been signs as of late that things have spiraling downhill for Pioneer. As much as some would hate to admit, it seems that the end is near for Pioneer.


This is/will be extremely unfortunate. Pioneers constant innovation has really pushed PDP tech to the edge and has forced many to keep up, and IMO, if they subside, we will all suffer for it.

 

[Fanaticalism]

Guess you will just have to keep your 9G Chad.

 

[greenland]



Quote:
Originally Posted by chadmak09 /forum/post/15501757


I don't think Pioneer is going anywhere.



But still..........................................

Very good.


. We need their engineering in the game, to keep the pressure on the competition to improve their product standards. I think we owe a lot of the black level improvements, in other plasmas and even LCDs, to having Pioneer raising the bar.


However, I am not very hopeful. In this economic climate, it makes no sense to cede the CES public relations ground to all your competitors. At the Pioneer press conference, they did not even mention their HDTV products.


They are great at engineering, but absolutely the worst at marketing. You have to throw your potential market a bone. For cripes sake, would it kill them to bring one of their new Kuro LCD models to the show.


Even the third tier company Vizio, is running rings around them when it comes to public relations. Vizio brought products to CES, and Pioneer did not, and did not even bother to spell out what their plans are. They are either brain dead in the marketing dept. or they are too huberistic to survive.

 

[maxdog03]



Quote:
Originally Posted by greenland /forum/post/15501368


Is this the beginning of the end for Pioneer in the HDTV market?


I can understand if they did not have the new Panasonic glass yet available for to assemble Demo models of their next Plasma models, but they surely have no such excuse for not being able to demostrate their LCD Kuro models, since they get the panels from Sharp, their partner.


It is starting to look like Pioneer may be slow walking away from the HDTV business.

Hard to say what's happening as it could be just a reorganizing of their strategy and game plan and didn't want to do anything at CES until they had that in place, but even if Pioneer were to leave the market, I would imagine Panasonic or possibly Samsung will grab the engineers and possibly purchase the technology to continue the same or near same level of performance. It really doesn't matter to me what the name is on the panel as long as it performs well.

 

[creemail]

I wish Pioneer was better financially, but the market wants to see, lower and lower, prices, and Pioneer is not willing to compete within the same market. Bottom Line: High end dealers will not survive in today's economy. Ask Fujitsu, Tweeter, etc...


Chris

 

[Fanaticalism]

Things are getting pretty bad. BB just anounced a mass layoff, Macys is shutting down a bunch of stores, and the laundry list goes on.

 

[chadmak09]

Man, This economy is really hurting!


What other company is gonna pust the envelope like pioneer if they are gone?


I still think the 10G will be here before we know it and will yet again be the new reference TV.


From what I am reading, The Neo-pdps are not looking to great. At least to me that is. But in alot of ways they are super cool.

I thought the neo's were gonna be the new king until the 10G's come around but I guess not. from what I hear, We'll be lucky if the neo's hit 8G blacks.

3 times brightness sounds great, but to me I would rather have deeper blacks.

I could care less about going brighter than the 9G.

 

[Clint S.]

I just posted this on another similar thread:


I don't know if you guys know it, but there's a strange PR at the Pioneer website about them outsourcing their panels, and some kind of teaming up by Sharp, a "mutual capitol investment". There could be more to it than that.
This just in..

A Customer Letter Concerning Display Panel Restructuring.
http://www.pioneerelectronics.com/PU...nologies..Kuro

 

[dmcfan]



Quote:
Originally Posted by Clint S. /forum/post/15505325


I just posted this on another similar thread:


I don't know if you guys know it, but there's a strange PR at the Pioneer website about them outsourcing their panels, and some kind of teaming up by Sharp, a "mutual capitol investment". There could be more to it than that.
This just in..

A Customer Letter Concerning Display Panel Restructuring.
http://www.pioneerelectronics.com/PU...nologies..Kuro

This is old news and has been known for a long time. It has been talked about ever since the 8g was nearing an end.

 

[Clint S.]



Quote:
Originally Posted by dmcfan /forum/post/15505444


this is old news and has been known for a long time. It has been talked about ever since the 8g was nearing an end.

e-x-c-u-s-e m-e!!

 

[talbain]

yeah that restructuring news is a good 8-10 months old now. sharp bought about 15% of pioneer. at the speculation was that sharp would be able to leverage the kuro/pioneer name in the lcd market, while at the same time pioneer would continue selling pdp televisions from panels manufactured by panasonic. but pioneer showing no lcd or pdp panels at ces is pretty ominous. i would have understood completely had they cancelled their presence at ces to conserve money, but the fact that they went ahead and spent the dough on a booth and STILL didn't show any tv tech is not a great sign...

 

[creemail]



Quote:
Originally Posted by chadmak09 /forum/post/15504233


Man, This economy is really hurting!


What other company is gonna pust the envelope like pioneer if they are gone?


I still think the 10G will be here before we know it and will yet again be the new reference TV.


From what I am reading, The Neo-pdps are not looking to great. At least to me that is. But in alot of ways they are super cool.

I thought the neo's were gonna be the new king until the 10G's come around but I guess not. from what I hear, We'll be lucky if the neo's hit 8G blacks.

3 times brightness sounds great, but to me I would rather have deeper blacks.

I could care less about going brighter than the 9G.

I have to agree with you as this is Panasonic's first year of marketing NeoPDP. It will mature by 2010. Like D-Nice mentioned capturing Pioneer's market is not what they are trying to achieve. They want the hard working family to be able to afford their displays.


Now the key for Panasonic (mainly that is within the PDP market) is to separate themselves. Samsung, Panasonic, and Pioneer are among the 3 remaining plasma manufacturer's that have concentrated their efforts making PDP's where they are. Samsung will not hurt as bad as Panasonic as they have invested heavily within LED LCDs.


Chris

 

[Spdr77]

Perhaps they are saving the best for last. It seems to me that alot of things are being saved for the last day. For instance, phillips is the only manufacturer with actual 3d technology with its WoWvx displays and they have not made one peep about it this year so far. The rest you have to wear ridiculous glasses and actually have "3d" content. With WoWvx, no need for glasses and 2d content can be displayed to 3d. Anyway Pioneer needs to unveil that "project kuro" display they were hyping up so much last year. I mean absolute black levels, infinite contrast ratios.... the most realistic HDTV on the market. No telling what the price is but hey, whos looking at price tags here =) Now if only Pioneer could take its technology with black levels and contract ratios and team up with samsungs "true" (i might add) 4k resolutions and OLED technology combined with Phillip's WoWvx technology.... Ladies and gentlemen the race is won, I think they have finally created the perfect TV.

 

[FiguredMaple]

Have a look at this from homecinemachoice.com:


"World exclusive: First look at Pioneer's next-gen Kuro picture processing tech, codenamed Fuga."

http://www.homecinemachoice.com/feat...Fuga+Kuro+tech

 

[westa6969]

Sharp entered the investment partnership to refine their audio components and they are also supposed to partner for the future of OLED but Sharp has admitted they still have some hurdles to get over and it may take a few more years than planned.


Sharp is in the process of restructuring K1,K2 due to economic conditions but I wouldn't be surprised to see Pio debut Kuro panels coming out of those restructures or maybe some from the new plant at Sakai where Sony has about a 40% share. Sakai has been finished early but it may take 3-6 months to bring production on line fully. I doubt Pio would be pulling panels from the Baja Tech Zone and put a Kuro badge on them - I would bet on Pio product coming out of Japan along with the Sony and higher end Sharps.


My biggest disappointment with CES is the lack of a genuine large flat panel that doesn't cost the price of an automobile, if we're going to rid the market of RPTV's at least we can get a friggin 70" under $6K - teasing us with a 82" LCD that won't ever make it to market for under $50K is a JOKE. We have two choices at 65" with Sharp and Panny and no one wants to step up with anything bigger - Samsung teased with a 70" over 2 yrs and then they debuted it at the price of a BMW. Does anyone else notice how really small a 52" LCD is for HT?

 

[Ozymandis]

Lots of doom and gloom over Pioneer, but if I remember before the Kuros, their plasmas were nice but not particularly overwhelming. Part of succeeding is not just offering a better product but offering it at a price that the customer feels is a value. Pioneer failed at that. When you could buy a Panasonic or Samsung that offered 80-90% of the performance at 50-60% of the price, they really weren't going to be around long.


I'm looking forward to seeing what Panasonic does to keep plasma technology relevant going forward. They are the remaining company who is heavily invested in plasmas... both Samsung and Hitachi have large LCD investments as well of remaining plasma makers.

 

[GqMagic]

After seeing Sonys xbr8 and Samsungs a950 lcds, they both are nipping at the heels of Pioneer in the black level, picture quality race.


The way the market is trending towards LCD, Pioneers only hope is their partnership with Sharp, who having been at the front of the LCD race in the beginning is losing ground especially in the larger sizes.


Those 55" Samsung a950s will be enough for a lot of people who don't want to pay Sony's prices and want an LCD in that size.


LCDs have come a long way and will continue to improve, what plasmas remain will also be great.


I bought a Elite 151 this week for under my threshold $5k and will be setting it up Monday evening

 

[DTV TiVo Dealer]

Sorry I did not read this thread till this moment as I would have posted my remarks here instead of the plasma thread where I responded to another member's post. Read this if you want to understand my knowledge of this speculation.


-Robert