According to Japanese newspaper Yomiuri, Toshiba will launch a Blu-ray player by the end of the year, followed by the introduction of a Blu-ray recorder shortly after.
Blu-ray players are nothing new - you can now pick up Technika-branded models from Tesco for as little as £69.97 - but the fact that Toshiba may be considering introduction a player may come as a surprise to some.
Cast your memory back to 2006/2007, and you might recall a fiercely contested "format war" between HD DVD and Blu-ray, two formats - led by Toshiba and Sony, respectively - competing to be the one true next-generation disc.
In February 2008, that bitter war came to an end when Toshiba discontinued its HD DVD format. The news came shortly after Warner Bros. announced that the studio, like many others, had decided to exclusively back Blu-ray.
In the year and five months that have since passed, Toshiba has attempted to undermine the relevance of high-definition formats with the introduction of new DVD-based technologies of its own - including the now-available XDE (eXtended Detail Enhancement), an upconverting DVD player that promises to "bring standard DVD quality closer to the HD experiences".
Despite appearing reluctant to concede to Blu-ray, Toshiba now looks set to adopt the format with the introduction of its own player late in 2009. Meanwhile, whilst Toshiba finally seems to be prepared to eat humble pie, Sony is showing no signs of sympathy.
Speaking in a blog post, Sony's vice president of communications Dave Migdal states "I was going to write something about the irony of it all; how after almost a year and a half following the end of HD-DVD/Blu-ray format war they joined the team. But that's just too obvious. I'll let others comment."
"I'll simply welcome them to this party and see if they bring anything to it. I guess it's better to show up late than not at all," he adds.
