Matsushita Electric Industrial Co, the company that expects to take a 40% stake of 3 million unit digital video disk (DVD) player market this year, is to increase production of both players and disks – following increased demand from the US and Europe. The Nihon Keizai Shimbun reports that the company, which also makes Panasonic-branded products, will start DVD production in China this year. In addition, the Japanese consumer electronics firm will ramp up production of DVD disks from its Californian plant to 2 million a month, adding six production lines to the existing two. The company also expects to boost its monthly domestic production of DVD players to 100,000 units by the end of fiscal 1998. The increase in sales and production of DVD players is good news for South East Asian semiconductor manufacturers, as the demand for memory chips for DVD players may help to fill some gaping holes in their order books, especially as DVD sales look likely to drive the market well into the next century (CI No 3,464).
