by Denise
Harrison
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Q: What do you believe were the biggest changes in the industry in the last five years? How did they change things and what impact did those changes have?
A: I suppose this is a rather predictable thing for me to say, but I strongly believe that the biggest change to hit the industry in the last five years has been the advent of DLP technology. We shipped our first products in early 1996, and, since then, we believe that DLP technology has had a significant effect on the market. Until that time, there was pretty much just the one show in town - LCD technology - with very little incentive to innovate or push the envelope. If nothing else, DLP technology has helped to accelerate the pace of change within the projector market to the point where the performance of all projectors is light years ahead of where it was five years ago.
But helping to make the projector market a more competitive one - in which the customer is the big winner - is far from the only thing DLP technology has done. It's enabled a whole new class of projectors which are marked by degrees of portability that were unthinkable five years ago. Our partners deserve a great amount of credit as well for the innovative systems design over this time period.
And speaking of 'unthinkable': who'd have thought, back in 1996, that digital cinema - so long a pipe-dream because of the lack of a digital projection technology that could rival film - could be so close to a reality today? But that's exactly what we've achieved with DLP Cinema technology.
Yes, I know my answer sounds like an extended commercial for DLP technology - but we really believe that the impact we've had has been of enormous significance in the market over the past five years.
Q: What is the state of the market now? What are the propelling forces and what are the barriers to growth?
A: If you put to one side some of the economic uncertainties that are plaguing business in North America right now, the projector market looks a really exciting place to be. We're confident we'll see at least the 30% growth the analysts are predicting for this year - any shortfall in the USA market will likely be made up by continued growth in Europe and other markets - with real upside to be had from the market for microportable projectors.
It's being propelled by the fact that it's an intensely competitive business to be in, which means that there's a continuing stream of reasons why new buyers should come into the market. Brightness, resolution, image quality, functionality and connectivity are increasing at a fantastic rate - we're seeing unbelievably short product life-cycles - while prices continue to go down.
We really don't see any near- or medium-term barriers to growth. As projectors get smaller, lighter, brighter, with better image quality, increased functionality and connectivity - and all at lower prices - the market will continue to expand. Today, most projectors are attached to laptops: I believe, in the near future, most projectors will be attached to PDAs or WAP phones. And as prices continue to fall, the whole consumer market starts to open up.
If there is a barrier to growth, it's only likely to be the capacity of the industry's infrastructure to support it. We had problems a while ago which are, thankfully, well behind us. Now, the whole industry finds itself in the grip of a shortage of lamps. But we're confident that these supply-side issues will get resolved, and that the industry will continue to grow rapidly.
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