Toshiba announced early in January 2007 that it was pulling out of the SED joint venture (JV) it formed with Canon in 2004. However, it does not look like the Japanese companies are backing down from the fight, as Canon and Toshiba stated that the decision was reached based on the assumption of prolonged litigation pending against Canon in the US.
Although SED will become a wholly owned subsidiary of Canon starting from January 29, 2007, it does not mean Toshiba is out of the picture. "We will defiantly be selling SED TV's in Australia under the Toshiba brand name. We are not certain when this will happen". Said Whittard. Overseas Toshiba employees say that screens could be in Australian stores by late 2007.
According to the Digi Times, as the flat screen TV market grows those involved in bringing SED (Surface-conduction Electron-emitter Display) TV technology to market will do most of their battling in the courtroom, with the legal wrangling between the SED TV developers (Toshiba and Canon) and the SED IP holder (Nano-Proprietary) set on a collision course with a jury trial.
For those keeping score in the SED legal saga, Nano-Proprietary (NNPP) appears to have won the latest round. The two companies Toshiba and Canon have agreed that they will carry out the SED panel business independently in order to facilitate the earliest possible launch of a commercial SED television business. According to Canon, production of SED panels will still begin in July and the completed panels will be sold by SED to Canon and Toshiba, meaning that Toshiba will still market SED TVs.
Currently Canon does not have production facilities to make the SED TVs andat the recent CES Show in Las Vegas the company indicated that it will initially outsource its own assembly to Toshiba. Toshiba was not available to comment on the production schedule, but Atsutoshi Nishida, president of Toshiba was quoted in a December Nikkei Business report as saying the company's SED production facility in Himeji, Japan was on schedule. In addition, in October 2006, CNET reported that SED had made some manufacturing breakthroughs that would make SED TVs competitive in the market with LCD TVs.
Nishida indicated that Toshiba does not plan on competing with LCD and PDP TVs in the market, as he considers the rival technologies as commodity applications, according to Nikkei Business. Toshiba will instead, at first, focus on niche professional market segments, such as the broadcasting industry, and its SED TVs will be limited and pricey, the paper stated.
Canon also noted that mass production will not start any time soon, and there will be only a limited number of SED TVs in the market this year.
Unlike Toshiba, Canon plans on targeting the consumer TV market. According to Richard Berger of Canon, the company envisions SED TVs as being the information window for the home, and in line with such a view, Canon aims to expand into the home market.
