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Beyond the Rebate, HD DVD Likely To Thrive

by Pravin on June 22nd, 2007 in formats, shopping.

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As June draws to a close, so does the $100 instant rebate program on Toshiba’s HD DVD players. You might recall that for the first half of the month, the $100 discount started on the lower-end models, was then extended to all models, and also included an additional discount on Toshiba’s HDTV sets in the last couple of weeks. It’s an instant rebate, which means the savings happen at the time of purchase. Well, this all ends on July 31, so if you’ve had your eye on an HD DVD player, act soon or you’ll miss the great deal.

Or will you?

I am not a Toshiba insider, but my business sense “radar” tells me that one of the following scenarios is likely, or maybe some combination:

  • Surprise! Welcome to the new prices on HD DVD players! They’re all $100 off from now on.
  • Prices will be lowered by $50-$75 on most HD DVD players. This would still make them cheaper than before, though not quite the $100 off that happened in June.
  • Another rebate program will come along by the end of the Summer or in time for Christmas.

Any kind of good discount will be enough to keep the sales momentum going, and increasing the adoption rate for HD DVD is crucial in the first couple of years of this technology. The competition’s adoption rate got a big boost from the mandatory inclusion of Blu-ray on PS3 units, but the sales numbers for individual Blu-ray players is actually lower than HD DVD players. Now that the initial PS3 sales boom is over, most of the new Blu-ray numbers are dependent on sales of dedicated players, and in this particular arena, HD DVD has always been ahead. Sales of Toshiba’s HD DVD players and Microsoft’s HD DVD add-on for the Xbox 360 have been pretty darn good. The corporations file their quarterly reports in a couple of months, and we’ll get to see first-hand what the real sales results are for the June rebate program. When those numbers come out, I think we’ll find that consumers have chosen HD DVD in large enough numbers that the studios and other providers (ahem, Blockbuster) will have to support the format if they’re not already doing so.

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