While international PC brands such as Dell and Hewlett-Packard (HP) have placed small-volume orders with Taiwan OEM/ODM makers for built-in Blu-ray Disc (BD) burners for use in their PCs to be launched in the third quarter of 2007, these makers have also received inquiries and orders from large retail channels in the US and Europe, with the volumes much higher than those from the PC brands, according to industry sources in Taiwan.
As BD burners are still very expensive, international PC brands are adopting them only for high-end PC models while DVD has remained as the mainstream standard of burners, the sources indicated. Therefore, their order volumes of BD burners are low, typically 2,000-3,000 units for a single order, the sources pointed out.
However, American and European retail channels have recently made inquires to Taiwan makers about OEM/ODM production of built-in BD burners and some of them have placed relatively large orders, as many as 20,000-30,000 units per order, the sources noted. These channels may plan to promote sales of BD-burner equipped PCs during the peak period prior to the 2007 holiday season, the sources pointed out.
