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Sony's Blu-Ray has finally won the battle of the high-definition DVD formats with Toshiba announcing it is to axe its rival HD DVD technology. The final blow to HD DVD came last week when US retail giant Wal-Mart announced it would only stock Sony's Blu-Ray format.

Toshiba's president and chief executive, Atsutoshi Nishida, said today that after a thorough review of its strategy, the company had decided a swift end to the format war would help the HD market.

"We carefully assessed the long-term impact of continuing the so-called 'next-generation format war' and concluded that a swift decision will best help the market develop," he said.
"While we are disappointed for the company and more importantly, for the consumer, the real mass market opportunity for high-definition content remains untapped and Toshiba is both able and determined to use our talent, technology and intellectual property to make digital convergence a reality."

The two formats have been battling for the growing high-definition share of the £12.3bn a year global home DVD market. High-definition DVDs offer improved visuals and sound, but also make it harder for content to be illegally copied and pirated.

Sony has had the upper hand for some time because its PlayStation 3 games console has a built-in Blu-Ray player. Sony has sold more than 10m Blu-Ray units while only about 1m HD DVD players have been sold, mostly in Japan. Last month Warner Bros, the world's largest DVD producer, announced it would only release in Blu-Ray, while Disney, MGM, Sony Pictures and Fox have also dumped HD DVD.

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