Blu-ray Disc Assoc. touts strong numbers

Blu-ray Disc Association officials are bullish on the growing strength of the Blu-ray Disc market, especially in the face of a down economy, the lowest number of tickets purchased for movie theaters in a decade, a continuing decline of DVD sales, and a surging move to watching all media digitally and electronically.

After years of being dismissed as a format artificially propped up by a predominance of Blu-ray players within the PlayStation machine, 2010 was the first year that the number of households with set-top Blu-ray players exceeded the number with PS3s, both in 2010 sales and overall-to-date.

BDA officials met with us HollywoodInHiDef.com during CES. Citing figures from Screen Digest, they noted that the overall U.S. home entertainment market was worth $18.5 billion in 2010, with Blu-ray sales up 64.2% in 2010 and Blu-ray rentals up 105.5%. Packaged media accounted for 88% of consumer content consumption in 2010 and Blu-ray was the fastest growing segment of all distribution.

Nielsen Video Scan & Adams Media research report that software sales increased by 75% in 2010.

On the Blu-ray 3D side, BD3D players now account for more than 20% of the Blu-ray set-top players currently in households. That number jumps to more than 60% if you include PS3 firmware upgrades.

FutureSource projects that 3D TVs will be in more than 60% of US households by 2015 and that Blu-ray 3D BD players will be in more than 75% of US households.

— By Scott Hettrick