According to new data from iSuppli, the HDTV maker Vizio has now become the leading North American LCD maker, taking the spot from Samsung.
For the Q1 2009 ended March 31st, the company’s market share jumped from 13.8 percent last quarter to 21.6 percent. Samsung’s market share only dropped slightly, but enough to move it to second place, at 19.9 percent.
iSuppli says Vizio’s success is directly related to the ongoing global recession. “Since the onset of the downturn, with budgets becoming increasingly tight, consumers are finding the company’s inexpensive sets more alluring,” iSuppli analyst Riddhi Patel added.
On average, 42-inch Vizio LCDs retail for $850 USD, while competitors such as Samsung and Sony sell theirs for $100-200 USD more.
Result for: tv maker
In March, Pioneer announced it was halting Plasma display production and today Vizio has made a similar announcement, putting another nail in the technology’s coffin.
The inexpensive HDTV maker has decided to move its focus to LCD sets, and will completely halt its plasma production by the end of the year.
With Vizio and Pioneer bowing out, three major manufacturers remain in the plasma business: LG, Panasonic, and Samsung.
Plasma TV shipments rose 28 percent for the Q4 2008 and were up over 10 percent for the entire year. Despite those statistics, LCD TVs control the market, selling about seven times the amount of plasma sets over a full year.
Result for: tv maker
According to a new ABI Research report, the amount of Web-enabled electronics will at least triple in the next five years, allowing more and more consumers to connect to the Internet via their video game consoles, TVs and Blu-ray players.
There are currently 60 million electronics components worldwide that are Web-enabled and ABI says there will be over 200 million by 2013. Internet-protocol-enabled TVs, which are the standard in Japan, will become commonplace in the USA, adds the report.
“One of the main facets of multi-screen offerings will be Web-based user interfaces and rich Web content across all three screens,” ABI research director Michael Wolf said in a statement. “Beyond the PC and mobile environment is the Internet-connected TV screen.”
More and more TV makers are integrating Ethernet ports into their TVs and Profile 2.0 Blu-ray players are doing the same.
Companies such as Netflix have encouraged the pushing of Internet capability by signing deals to have digital copies of movies streamed directly through Blu-ray players or TVs.
