Sony plans new LCD TV models

Sony Corp. said on Wednesday it will launch nine new LCD TV models in Japan in the next few months including a 52-inch high-definition set, aiming at demand in the critical year-end holiday shopping season.

Sony, the world's largest liquid crystal display (LCD) TV maker by value, said the 52-inch model, its first in the 50-inch and above class, will hit store shelves on Oct. 20 and is expected to sell for about 800,000 yen ($6,850).

The Tokyo-based electronics and entertainment conglomerate said most of the nine models will become available in overseas markets by the Christmas shopping season.

"I have been saying we will turn our TV business profitable in the second half of this business year. We are just one step away from making it reality," Sony Executive Deputy President Katsumi Ihara told a news conference.

Sony has lagged far behind Sharp Corp. in the LCD TV market. But a multimillion dollar marketing campaign for its Bravia brand and joint panel production with Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. helped it to grab the top spot in the fast-growing but highly competitive market.

Research firm DisplaySearch expects the global LCD TV market to balloon 75 percent to $44.5 billion in 2006.

Sony, like its rivals Sharp and Panasonic maker Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. Ltd., has been fighting steep price declines by shifting its focus to larger and generally more profitable models.

The average selling price of Sony's LCD TVs was 194,000 yen in April-June, a 38 percent premium to the industry average of 141,000 yen, Ihara said.

Sony aims to boost the ratio of 40-inch and larger models to its total LCD TVs sales to 50 percent in value terms by the end of the year from about 30 percent now.

It held a 16 percent share of the global LCD TV market in April-June in value terms, followed by Samsung with 15.4 percent and Philips Electronics with 11 percent, according to DisplaySearch.

Shares of Sony, which aims to more than double its LCD TV shipments to six million units in the year to next March, closed down 0.2 percent at 4,990 yen, underperforming the Tokyo stock market's electrical machinery index, which rose 0.32 percent.