B-school prof and CE expert comments on DVD format war

As you may know, one of the big news items to come out of this year's CES was the indication that several prominent DVD producers were going to discontinue producing HD-DVDs, signaling that Blue Ray may be finally winning the DVD format war.

Gloria Barczak, marketing professor and consumer electronics branding expert at the College of Business Administration at Northeastern University, feels that it may be premature to write the obituary for the HD-DVD format:

However, the prediction that the format war is over may be premature for two reasons.
“First, the price of Blu-ray players is still high and now that Toshiba has slashed its prices on its HD-DVD players by 50%, it makes Blu-ray even more expensive,” Prof. Barczak points out. “Although early adopters may be willing to pay whatever they have to for Blu-ray, the average consumer will not spend $500. for a DVD player. So, unless the price for Blu-ray players comes down, we still may see sales of HD-DVD machines.

“Second, and related to price, is that the consumer still holds the key to determining which format wins,” Prof. Barczak continues. “If consumers are reluctant to buy Blu-ray players because of price or other reasons, it could force the movie studios to back-peddle and support both formats. Certainly, having one format ends confusion for the consumer but they will still be unwilling to buy if they don't see value in what they're buying. It seems that many consumers are unaware of the two formats and their differences and even more so, about the move to HD TV in 2009 and what this means. Unless the consumer is educated by the industry, the format war could continue for at least another year.”

You can find Prof. Barczak’s bio here: http://cba.neu.edu/faculty/directory_detail.cfm?e=106