New formats drive future magnetic tape biz - Home Products: Consumer Electronics

Discount Store News, Jan 6, 1992

New Formats Drive Future Magnetic Tape Biz

There was a time when a magnetic media article started with audiotape and ended with videotape, with a quick stop at new lengths, improved packaging or improved formulation. And the same held for retailers: pick your brand, pile it high, watch it fly.

But those were the old days. Today, conventional audiotape and videotape remains the bulk of the market, but both products have flattened over the past three years, and growth opportunities now reside in newer formats, including 8mm videotape, DAT (and soon, DCC) audiotape and diskettes. According to Fuji marketing manager of computer media division, Jeff Ash, the fastest growing format is one new to the mass market: data storage units.

With the advent of the compact disc, vendors have scrambled to find an audiotape replacement, sinking slowly in the West as Americans become accustomed to the hiss- and scratch-free digital format.

Three digital formats - digital audiotape, digital compact cassette and Sony's new Mini Disc - will battle it out for supremacy in the coming years, but each has distinct drawbacks. DCC, which seems to have the most marketing clout behind it, is a retrofit technology; the players will accept both new digital tapes and conventional audiotape. In a way, it's not unlike designing a compact disc player that also plays LPs, and at $500 or so, it's an expensive toy for consumers used to paying $150 for a conventional tape deck or compact disc player.

DAT, which suffered the legal costs of being the first digital reproduction system on the market, likewise costs too much (about $700) and has met with little enthusiasm from vital prerecorded software producers. Those same companies seem ready to support DCC.

Sony's Mini Disc is not quite up to compact disc standards, although the company said that the difference is not audible to the average listener, and the hardware, introduced at between $300 and $400, promises to be less expensive and more flexible than either of the other two formats. The unit can be used as a home recorder/player, a "Walkman," or possibly as a car stereo.

Blank media makers are, naturally, hesitant to get into any of these formats in a major way until demand develops. But all said that they are looking very hard at various optical media products. Certainly, recordable CD is in the future. If Sony can put an erasable and recordable system into a Walkman, it won't be long until someone develops a recordable device that will be compatible with present technology.

At the video end, the VHS VCR is so entrenched in American homes that recordable optical media is probably years away. Laser discs have found a comfortable home with videophiles, but that popularity is unlikely to translate to recording devices until the advent of advanced cable systems and other technologies, like HDTV. Most growth today is in "Pro" level videotape (Fuji, Maxell and Sony are all stressing the category), as well as increased length like T-160 and T-180 lengths from BASF.

Eight millimeter camcorders have become so popular that blank 8mm tape, which has virtually no home application, is probably the fastest growing segment in the videotape market. High-8 is just becoming a player, and if anyone ever gets an affordable Hi-8 VCR on the market, the appeal to videophiles should be strong.

Data storage is the next frontier, said Fuji's Ash. "Computer users are back-up addicts," he said. "But with increasing memory in the average home computer, diskettes just don't do the job; they take too much time and don't hold enough. One cartridge will take care of your backup needs quickly and unattended."

The cartridges, which retail in the $30 to $40 range, are finding their way to retail shelves, particularly at wholesale clubs and office supply superstores, Ash said. "It's a real growth opportunity for us," he said. "And for retailers, it's an easy product to sell."