Sony First TV Maker to Split with CEA on ‘Ultra HD’ Label

Sony released a diplomatically worded statement praising CEA’s 4K messaging effort at the same time it ruled out subscribing to that effort’s final outcome. “As a leader at the forefront of new display technology such as HD, 3D and beyond, Sony lauds the CEA’s efforts to come up with a common language to describe the next generation high-definition technology,” spokeswoman Elizabeth Boukis said.

However, Sony wants to “ensure clarity for consumers and delineate between today’s and tomorrow’s technology,” Boukis said of differentiating between 4K and 8K. Thus, Sony “will continue to use the 4K moniker for its products and will market its future products as 4K ultra high-definition,” or “4K UHD” for short, Boukis said. Jeff Joseph, CEA senior vice president-communications and strategic partnerships, hadn’t commented by our deadline on Sony’s action. But CEA has said use of the Ultra HD label is voluntary and that CE makers are free to use whatever “descriptors” they want next to the Ultra HD messaging. Joseph on Thursday praised the 4K working group’s Ultra HD deliberations as a “fair and open” process of consensus-building, but conceded that not all participants would be happy with the outcome.

Of the several TV makers besides Sony that have indicated plans to ship 4K TVs, LG backs Ultra HD and heavily advocated for its CEA adoption. Toshiba also supports the Ultra HD “terminology,” executive Scott Ramirez told us Friday. Other set maker executives hadn’t responded by our deadline, including those whose companies haven’t announced specific 4K TV plans. As for an official Ultra HD logo, we're told one doesn’t yet exist, nor will one be unveiled Thursday at an LG event planned to trumpet the launch of its first 4K TVs. The event starts at 11 a.m. at a Video & Audio Center store in Torrance, Calif. CEA’s Joseph has said he will speak at the event.

Meanwhile, questions abound about the process for choosing Ultra HD and how CEA within 24 hours went from predicting last Tuesday it would take 3-4 weeks to finalize a solution to landing on Wednesday unanimous Board of Industry Leaders approval of the final label and its definitions. Critics argued that speed and turnabout typified a process in which Ultra HD was fast-tracked to the detriment of other proposals, such as “4K.” Those who have spoken publicly against using “4K,” including LG Vice President John Taylor, have cited consumer research results in which 4K fared poorly as a marketing message as the reason why “4K” as label would not be a good idea (CED Oct 16 p1).

But critics allege the deck was stacked against “4K"-label advocates from the beginning, including in the manner in which the research methodology was carried out and with little input and oversight from participants in the 4K working group. We've learned the research firm Ipsos, under contract from CEA, last month sampled about 1,000 consumers online and in phone interviews for their preferences on what a label should say to delineate 4K TVs. Consumers were asked to rate their responses on five choices: (1) “Ultra Definition”; (2) “Ultra High Definition” or “Ultra HD”; (3) “Quad High Definition” or “Quad HD”; (4) “HD-Plus”; and (5) “4K."

Among the five options tested, “4K” finished last in consumer preference, and critics of the research say that’s because it was the only option of the five that was deliberately presented to consumers without a “High Definition” or “HD” modifier next to it. There’s no telling how “Quad HD” fared in the survey results, but advocates of using that term for 4K products also lost out to Ultra HD proponents. One such “Quad HD” advocate argued for reserving “Ultra HD” for future generations of 8K products and that an “HD, Quad HD, Ultra HD” progression would have “resonated” with consumers, he said. But he wouldn’t say what plans his company has for using the Ultra HD label should it introduce 4K products.