Will focus on flat panel LCD and OLED technologies instead
Sony has announced that it will be exiting its money-losing rear-projection TV business in favor of focusing on the expanding flat panel LCD and OLED market space. According to Sony, sales of rear-projection televisions have been slowing down for some time, and they recently revised forecasts from 700,000 units to 400,000 units; this number compares to 1.1 million units only a year ago.
Sony says that 85% of the rear-projection sets were sold in the U.S. and about an additional 10% were sold in Europe. Production in the three plants in Japan, Mexico, and Malaysia will be halted. No word on what will happen to those plants. Sony says that it expects to sell over 10 million LCD TVs in this fiscal year, which is up from 6.3 million last fiscal year.
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