Sony to quit manufacturing of loss making, rear projection TVs

SONY Rear-Projection TelevisionThe Japanese electronics giant, Sony Corp. has announced that it will stop manufacturing rear-projection televisions to focus on its flat-panel products.

Sony said that the company will focus its resources on LCD and organic light-emitting diode technology to address the strong flat- screen TV market demand.

The production of rear-projection TVs, which are currently being manufactured at factories in Japan, Malaysia and Mexico, will stop in February, 2008, the company added.

The loss-making rear-projection televisions - which use a projector, lenses and mirrors to create images on large screens - have fallen in popularity.

Shinji Obana, spokesman, Sony Corp. said, “The sales of rear-projection TVs had been declining recently as LCD TVs gain in popularity and get bigger, so production at the three plants that make the rear-projection TVs in Japan, Mexico and Malaysia, will be halted.”

The company sells 85 % of its rear-projection TVs in the U.S. markets, and around 10 % in Europe. It recently showed off the world's first commercial OLED TV, with a screen just 3mm thick.

Earlier this week, Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., which makes Panasonic brand products, Hitachi and Canon forged a tie-up in their LCD businesses.

The company expects to sell 10 million liquid-crystal-display TVs this financial year, till March, up from 6.3 million the previous year.

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