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“March Surprise: Pioneer to End PDP Production”: this was the title of the article from “Display Daily” in my Inbox on Thursday (March 6th). According to the article, the news came from an unkown leak, and an official announcement was to follow. The official announcement did come from Pioneer on Friday (March 7th). One Yahoo headline read: “Pioneer to post loss, exit plasma display production.”
Sigh! This was sad news indeed: a loss of a “pioneer” in the plasma arena that had raised the image quality bar to high standards. Up until CEDIA last year, I had not paid much attention to plasma displays. That changed after looking at offerings from Panasonic and Pioneer: there was a “wow” factor that I had not seen before. Sandy echoed a similar sentiment in his review of a Panasonic plasma display. So what happened?
Pioneer had sought after a market where they commanded a price premium in return for superior image quality. That was going to be a niche market and in the end did not provide Pioneer with a sustainable business. With the LCD camp driving aggressive pricing and coupling that with improved picture quality, their market share never quite got a level where they could perhaps leverage high-volumes.
But Pioneer has not exited the business entirely. They will still stay in the market, although going forward their plasma panels will be sourced from Panasonic. How they differentiate their panels from Panasonic’s will be interesting. What the price differential ends up being, will also be interesting.