DVD-Recording Drives Sales Ramping Up Slowly

Staff On Nov 22 2004 - 8:00am

Retail sales of recordable DVD technology are gradually gaining momentum as more PCs and camcorders equipped with the drives hit the market, according to a report delivered by NPD Group's Stephen Baker, at the Optical Storage Symposium, here.

Of the 6.5 million recordable DVD drives sold in the United States from January 2003 through August 2004, 53.6 percent shipped with personal computers. Another 32.6 percent were sold as aftermarket add-ons to PCs, according to NPD data.

Unit sales of DVD camcorders made up 5.4 percent, or less than 300,000, of the total camcorder market, but sales are trending upward, grabbing more than 20 percent of the total market in the period from May 2004 to August 2004.

Sales of home DVD recorder decks for the 20-month period ending in August just topped 600,000 units, comprising only 2.2 percent of the total $2.8 billion DVD deck market, which includes players and recorders.

Blank DVD media sales soared in the first eight months of 2004, with cumulative sales approaching 300 million units.

A breakdown of the market continues below and on p. 62.