New York — Sony Electronics said its specially designed Bravia LCD line will not be exclusive to Wal-Mart, during the East Coast version of its biannual roundtable with its president Stan Glasgow and Randy Waynick, senior VP of its home products division, this morning.
Waynick said Sony will be selling a “value-priced” Bravia M Series by the end of July and the beginning of August to Wal-Mart that will “not be exclusive” to the chain and would also go to Target and other retailers. Sony confirmed the decision to sell Bravia-branded sets during a West Coast press briefing on Monday. Wal-Mart discussed an expanded Sony presence in its refurbished CE departments recently.
Waynick did not provide pricing as yet for the three SKUs that are 26-inches, 32-inches and 40-inches. He described the selection as “the foundation of the lineup” in that it will not have all the design elements of the rest of the Bravia line and will only go up to 720p vs. its emphasis on 1080p for the rest of the line.
These units were not on display during last week’s press conference on Sony’s video line and advertising plans.
Among the other subjects Glasgow and Waynick also discussed were the following:
- a six- to seven-times jump in Blu-ray set-top player sales in the United States during 2007 vs. 2006;
- the state of CE retailing in the wake of the Tweeter filing; and
- Sony’s No. 1 market share in a variety of categories.
For more on this conference, watch for updates at www.TWICE.com and in the June 18 print edition.
