James Delahunty
23 Mar 2008 18:13
According to a survey conducted by the NPD Group during the week ending February 20th, millions are set to buy Blu-ray hardware within the next six months. Of all respondents, about 10.8% said they would buy a Blu-ray player within the next six months, helping to lead NPD to a prediction of two million player sales in that time frame.
The figure is based on the assumption that 25% of people who reveal intent to purchase something usually do so. So far, less than one million Blu-ray stand-alone players have been sold, but the numbers are considered higher because the multi-million selling PlayStation 3 (PS3) console has its own built in Blu-ray player.
While NPD did acknowledge that "intent to buy" figures are not enough to go on in the market, it noted that the increased interest is impressive considering this is the traditional down season for consumer electrionics. "This (increased interest) happened during a quiet part of the year after the Super Bowl, and there was bad weather for shopping," an NPD spokesman said.