The HD-DVD format was recognized as a new media type in 2003 by the DVD Forum. The main developers and supporters of this format were Toshiba, NEC and Microsoft. In addition, it received support from major production companies such as Universal Studios, Paramount Pictures and Warner Bros.
In addition, Microsoft added an HD-DVD player to the Xbox 360, which was its big entry into the video game industry. Despite all this support, the truth is that it had a hard time competing with Blu-ray. So much so that it ended up disappearing due to the great capabilities of Blu-ray and the great support it received.
Toshiba and Microsoft, the big supporters of HD DVD
First of all, you should know that this new format leaves DVDs aside. The new HD DVD format offered a capacity of 15 TB on single-layer discs and reached 30 TB on dual-layer discs. Regular DVDs had a capacity of 4.7 GB and dual-layer models offered 8.5 GB of capacity. We are talking about a capacity increase of between 4 and 2 times for single-layer HD DVDs and 8 to 4 times for dual-layer DVDs. Note that this format only accepts videos in FullHD resolution (1080p).
The problem with HD DVD is that Blu-ray would come out shortly after. The developers of this new format were Sony, Panasonic, Philips and Microsoft. This new format had 25 GB per single-layer disc and up to 50 GB of capacity per dual-layer disc.
Additionally, this new format offered support for 4K video resolution. Finally, it should be noted that Blu-ray benefited from the support of Disney, Warner Bros, 20th Century Fox and Sony Pictures.
For about a year, they competed for the market. It was in 2007 that the decline of HD DVD began, right with the launch of the PS3. Sony launched this console with a Blu-ray player, which was a huge problem for HD DVD. Just a year later, Toshiba announced the end of production of these discs and optical drives.
A failure that nearly bankrupted Toshiba
The company had been in financial trouble for some time, but the HD DVD format put an end to that. Toshiba invested a lot of money into developing and promoting the format, even paying for some movies and games to be released exclusively in the format. Money they would never get back.
Adding to the problem is the fact that the European Commission has filed an antitrust lawsuit against Toshiba for its participation in the DVD Forum. The lawsuit highlighted that the company had used its position to favor the new format over Blu-ray. In the end, Toshiba had to pay a fine of $129 million, which only made the situation worse.
Due to the great failure of this format, many investors sold their shares. Moreover, after the lawsuit filed by the European Commission, investors did not want to invest in the company.
A combination of circumstances that has left Toshiba unable to raise its head since. The climax came in 2015, when the company was involved in an accounting scandal that cost it tens of millions of dollars.
Following this scandal and the failure of HD DVD, Toshiba went bankrupt and was bought by the Japan Industries Solutions Corporation consortium. To get the company out of the hole, this consortium dismembered the company and sold the most profitable parts that could quickly generate income to pay off debts.