At a press event yesterday at the CeBIT tradeshow in Hannover, Germany, several companies including Studio Canal, Universal, Toshiba and Microsoft announced the establishment of the European HD DVD Promotional Group.

As the European counterpart to the North American HD DVD Promotional Group and working with the HD DVD Promotion Group originally organised in Japan, the new non-profit organisation completes the global promotion structure for HD DVD, "working to educate consumers on the quality and value of the format and to bolster marketing efforts for the format as HD DVD gains momentum across Europe."

By the end of Q1 2007, more than 100 titles will be available throughout Europe. More than one-third of these titles come from European studios and none of them are currently available on any other high-definition format. The overwhelming majority of the discs are replicated locally. With more than 21 studios and distributors, 14 authoring studios and eight replicators producing HD DVD content and discs throughout the region, the number of titles is expected to increase rapidly throughout the year with an estimated 600 titles expected worldwide by December 2007.

"Our goal is to achieve global penetration of the HD DVD format, so a lot of work has gone into making sure that authoring houses and replicators across Europe were given the training and expertise they need to get up and running quickly allowing a wealth of European content to hit the market right from the beginning," said Yoshihide Fujii, Chairman of the HD DVD Promotion Group and President and CEO of Toshiba's Digital Media Network Company.

"This will be a key differentiator for HD DVD in Europe for the foreseeable future. Combine that with a solid line-up of US titles and affordable hardware and consumers have a lot of options to create a home theater experience that is unparalleled."

Examples of the wide range of content originating in Europe include Stalingrad (Enemy at the Gate), 2 brothers, Les Choristes, La Grande Vadrouille, L'Armée des Ombres, Le Cercle Rouge, Das Parfum, Graf Montenegro, and La Tigre e la Neve. Studios said they are are committed to announcing HD DVD titles on the same day and date as DVDs wherever possible.

Hollywood studios also made a strong commitment to the market and announcing the release of several US blockbusters titles including Babel, Casino, Charley and The Chocolate Factory, Dreamgirls, Happy Feet, The Holiday, The Matrix Trilogy, Ray, and World Trade Center.

In 2006, HD DVD won a clear edge in the PC market, according to Techno Systems Research (TSR), a major
Japanese market research company. Some 60 percent of the high definition optical disk drives for PC applications produced worldwide were HD DVD. In slim HD DVD drives for portable PCs, the advantage increased to 70 percent, TSR says.

However, backers of the competing Blu-ray Disc format were already declaring victory. The Blu-ray Disc Association chairman Frank Simonis said that not only will Blu-ray beat out HD DVD, it will completely do in the standard DVD. "Within three years it will just be Blu-ray," he said at the CeBIT trade show.

The ultimate success of the Blu-ray format is predicated on the sales of the Blu-ray disc-equipped PlayStation 3 games console. Sony said it has sold 1.84 million PS3 units by the end of 2006, and has a million more ready to launch in Europe next week. Though the HD DVD camp concedes that PS3 sales mean HD DVD players are being outsold almost five to one, it claims that sales of movie titles in HD DVD format are still level with Blu-ray titles.

Story filed 15.03.07