Toshiba concedes defeat in DVD format war

Japanese high-tech giant Toshiba on Tuesday announced its withdrawal from the high-definition DVD business, conceding defeat in a long-running format war with rival Sony.

Toshiba Corp. said that it aimed to end sales of its HD DVD machines by the end of March, clearing the way for the Blu-ray format developed by Sony Corp. and its partners to become the industry standard.

"We carefully assessed the long-term impact of continuing the so-called 'next-generation format war' and concluded that a swift decision will best help the market develop," said Toshiba chief executive Atsutoshi Nishida.

In a replay of the VHS-Betamax video cassette format war in the late 1970s, Japanese high-tech giants had been battling to set the industry standard in next-generation DVDs with two rival formats that are incompatible.

But Toshiba and its HD DVD partners suffered a series of heavy setbacks, with Hollywood titan Warner Brothers and US retail giant Wal-Mart both throwing their weight behind Blu-ray.

The Blu-ray disc overcomes DVD-reading issues by placing the data on top of a 1.1-mm-thick polycarbonate layer. Having the data on top prevents birefringence and therefore prevents readability problems. And, with the recording layer sitting closer to the objective lens of the reading mechanism, the problem of disc tilt is virtually eliminated. Because the data is closer to the surface, a hard coating is placed on the outside of the disc to protect it from scratches and fingerprints.