2002 Sales Turbocharge DTV Transition Into New Year

31-Jan-03

Surpassing projected sales totals by several hundred thousand units and elevating cumulative sales to new heights, factory-to-dealer sales of digital television (DTV) products totaled 2,487,502 units and $4,210,151,531, according to figures released by the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA). The 2002 sales surpassed the 2001 total by 73 percent in units and 61 percent in dollars. CEA defines DTV products as integrated sets and monitors displaying active vertical scanning lines of at least 480p and, in the case of integrated sets, receiving and decoding ATSC terrestrial digital transmissions. ""Celebrating these numbers, the recent plug-and-play agreement with cable and the momentum in the analog to DTV transition makes for the best possible entrance into the new year,"" said CEA President and CEO Gary Shapiro. ""We now have sold just under five million DTV units, which represents a phenomenal $8.6 billion market investment in this transition with average unit prices well within the reach of middle-income consumers. And the best is yet to come as more and more programming becomes available in HD and millions of cable households gain access to HDTV through the convenience of plug-and-play products.""But the biggest celebration was had by all those HDTV owners when they tuned in to watch the big game in high-definition. You don't even have to be a football fan to end up cheering when you're watching HDTV."" CEA released additional DTV sales figures today, including single-month sales figures for December 2002, which totaled 308,388 units on dollar sales of $532,773,257. The percentage of DTV products sold in 2002 capable of receiving ATSC signals totaled 11.07 percent for the year and, cumulatively, now stands at 11.47 percent. Additionally, CEA reported that 110,024 stand-alone set-top box units and 165,388 integrated sets were sold in 2002, which represents a 38 percent unit increase over 2001.Data cited in this release is available for purchase through CEA's Market Activity Reports and Analysis (MARA) program. For more information, visit www.eBrain.org/mara.For more information about the CEA, visit www.ce.org.

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