Friday, January 4, 2008

Warner Abandons HD-DVD

Burbank-based Warner Bros. Entertainment announced Friday afternoon that it will begin to release its high definition DVD titles in only Blu-ray Disc format, beginning later this year, and will not be issuing HD-DVD titles after May. According to Jeff Bewkes, President and CEO of Time Warner, the choice to distribute just Blu-ray "comes at the right time and is the best decision both for consumers and Time Warner." The high definition DVD market has been suffering from consumer confusion over the competing HD-DVD and Blu-ray high definition formats. HD-DVD is backed by Toshiba, Paramount, and NBC Universal; Blu-ray is backed by Sony, 20th Century Fox, Walt Disney, and others.