Taiwan's DVD Recorder Output Grows As Prices Plummet Jul 15, 2004

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Taiwanese producers of DVD recorders are increasing their production as low prices encourage users around the world to gravitate to DVD as a replacement for other recording methods. According to a news item by Baker Li of Reuters, the increase should soon make Taiwan the worlds second-largest supplier of DVD recorders.

With retail prices falling in 2004 to half of the cost in 2003, some analysts are predicting a four-fold increase in sales by companies such as Lite-On IT Corp. and Mustek Systems Inc. That will put Taiwan in second place, after Japan, in the U.S. $4.3 billion industry. Japanese competitors, which control about half the global market, include Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. Ltd., which makes Panasonic-brand electronics, Sony Corp., and Toshiba Corp.

The Reuters report quotes Ting Chien, spokesman for Lite-On IT, a unit of Lite-On Technology Corp. and Taiwan's largest DVD recorder maker. The company's customers include Wal-Mart stores. Lite-On IT sold Wal-Mart about 100,000 DVD recorders in 2003, and expects to sell it 1 million units in 2004.

The report says that prices for DVD records start at around U.S. $180 in Taiwan and $200 n the U.S., but an analyst quoted in the report expects the price will fall to $100 in the first half of 2005.

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