North American shares of Sony Corporation rose by as much as 5 per cent yesterday on the strength of its victory in the high definition format war, following Toshiba’s shock plans to discontinue support of its HD DVD platform.
The company’s shares recorded a session high of USD 47.07 on the New York Stock Exchange, later easing to USD 46.30, up USD 1.52 (3.4 per cent) from Friday.
Ralph Shackart, an analyst at William Blair, said that the success of Blu-ray is likely to fuel an increased uptake in the number of PlayStation 3 consoles sold, telling Reuters:
"We believe Blu-ray’s victory could drive market share gains for the PS3, as we believe consumers will now be more willing to pay up (versus 360) for the standard Blu-ray player.”