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Technology Stocks : Creative Labs (CREAF) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Fred Fahmy who wrote (13286)	1/9/1999 10:20:00 PM
From: greenspirit	Respond to of 13925

Hi Fred, Article...Industry Leaders Forecast Soaring Market For DVD, Divx During 1999 CES Daily By CES Staff 13:14 01/08/99 cesweb.org By Cathy Ciccolella, TWICE Forecasting total sales of at least 2 million digital video disc (DVD) players in 1999, a CES panel of hardware and software suppliers and retailers sparred over the benefits of the open DVD format vs. the Divx feature -- and how the two will co-exist -- yesterday. Richard Sharp, president of Circuit City and chairman of Divx, said Circuit City sold 106,000 DVD players in the fourth quarter of 1998, with 75,000 of those sold in December. He did not say how many of those had the Divx feature, although Circuit City is estimated to have sold about 80% of the 87,000 players sold in the fourth quarter. "We were struggling for inventory throughout the fourth quarter and found strong consumer acceptance of Divx and non-Divx DVD both," Sharp told an overflow audience at the CES seminar titled "A Look At DVD Technologies." Wearing his Divx hat, Sharp noted that Divx customers had returned 3.7 times to purchase additional software in the four to six weeks since buying their players. The seven retailers that offered Divx DVD players sold 87,000 units in the fourth quarter, with December accounting for more than 62,000 of those, Sharp said. Warren Lieberfarb, president of Warner Home Video, a strong opponent of Divx, questioned the significance of those sales figures. "It's important to understand the out-of-stock position of open DVD at the end of last year," Lieberfarb said. "We need to ask how much of that Divx business came because open DVD was not available in stores." He said the industry sold 675,000 total DVD players in the last four months of 1998. Lieberfarb said that from September through December, overall sales ran seven-to-one in favor of open DVD over Divx players. "Of the 1.4 million total Ô98 DVD shipments, open DVD has an installed base of 1.2-1.3 million," he noted. Other retailers on the panel said the growing consumer awareness of DVD had boosted sales significantly during the holiday season. "Our fourth-quarter DVD business far exceeded our expectations, even in some markets where we didn't expect it to do too well," said Jeff Yapp of the Hollywood Entertainment software chain, which carries about 200 DVD titles. He said DVD accounted for 2% of sales and up to 3% of total revenues in some Hollywood Entertainment stores last year. John Keating of The Good Guys said, "We sold almost 15,000 DVD players in December, and we could have sold 6,000-7,000 more if we'd had them." John Marmaduke of the Hastings software chain -- which has stores primarily in markets under 150,000 population -- said, "We have been renting the hardware as well as offering DVD software, and we've had remarkable adoption from the non-trend-setting markets." At Tower Records and Video, DVD software inventories have been turning more than five times -- 40% more than any other category, according to Tower's John Thrasher. He said, however, that he sees some confusion among customers about software titles that are available in one DVD format but not the other, "and this may lead to reluctance to buy by some consumers." On the hardware side, Mike Fidler of Sony predicted "unprecedented and impressive growth in 1999" for DVD. "The most important part of the growth of a new format is consumer acceptance, and consumers understand and appreciate the benefits of DVD," Fidler noted. Thomson Consumer Electronics' Larry Pesce predicted that the industry could sell "well beyond 2 million'" DVD players this year and added, "Divx is growing very significantly and will represent a very significant portion of that total volume." Pesce added that Thomson is aggressively encouraging "as many dealers as possible to jump on the Divx bandwagon."

To: Fred Fahmy who wrote (13286)	1/11/1999 1:40:00 AM
From: Gambit	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 13925

I'd say your right OM sound is going dry. I'd rather NOT hold a company that has such a high % of sells on 1 iteam that might not be all that as far as profit. SBL value is the hot seller NOT the HIGH priced SBL. DVD is hot but not for CREAFs profit Speakers are CREAFs 1 smart move last year. But it lowered the price point so it could make less money... stupid. Video is up in the air... it can all dry up in the blink of a eye for creaf if it doesn't buy Nvida. Its your money. And can CREAF run Nvida well... I bet it can't. Love to know what the ETCs are??? I bet CREAF would as well : ) Video erosion... I see it that CREAF has a shot at this but will blow it. It has nothing but a low price point and NOT knowing what it's market is. I think this IS (NOW) CREAFs BEST SHOT... History will back me up on this one big time that it has not a clue. I'm still looking for sims "we own the pci audio" or the "consumer electronics" or " OEMS" or " high margins" or you get the point ; ) CREAF is a DOG because its run that way... simple. Its at best a trading stock and nothing more. Even its web site sucks next to DIMD. CREAFs site looks like and runs like a kid put it up... again NOT having a clue. adam-