DreamWorks continuing to release on HD DVD
It has been a bad month for early adopters of Toshiba's HD DVD format. When Toshiba declared the discontinuation of its HD DVD businesses, we posed the question; what will you now be doing with your HD DVD player?
Well, DreamWorks today brings a touch of good news for all the early adopters out there as the movie studio has announced that it plans to continue the release of its movies on HD DVD right up until August.
DreamWorks Chief Executive Jeffrey Katzenberg said:
"We have a partnership with Toshiba and have an obligation to see this through."
""As you know, we have been well-compensated for our support. It really is in their court at this point to really declare what the next step will be. We're poised either way to jump into the marketplace when the conditions are right to do so."
What Mr Katzenberg means to say is that the studio plans to see the contract through and get its hands on the combined $150 million offered to Paramount and DreamWorks for their commitment to HD DVD.
JP Morgan analyst Barton Crockett states that this decision from DreamWorks makes financial sense. "It might mean they'll lose the opportunity to sell Bee Movie on Blu-ray, although the market for Blu-ray is still pretty small and the offset is that they'd get money from Toshiba, which may in fact be more", he said.
Meanwhile, DreamWorks plans on releasing Bee Movie on HD DVD next month and has asked Toshiba how to proceed. We'd love to hear what Toshiba's answer would be; "errr, errr, didn't you guys get the memo?"
