Rebecca Day

With Dolby’s licensing revenue from CE products in decline and projections for PC shipments lowered, executives said in their fiscal Q4 2010 earnings webcast last week that the company will focus on “new geographies,” online content, smartphones and mobile entertainment devices for long-term growth. For the fiscal year, Dolby reported total revenue of $922.7 million, compared with $719.5 million the previous year. Fiscal year net income was $283.4 million, compared with $243 million.

ESPN Research + Analytics released results Thursday of what it called “the most extensive body of 3D research ever done,” conducted during ESPN’s telecast of the 2010 World Cup soccer matches from South Africa and comprising more than 1,000 test sessions at the two-year-old Disney Media and Advertising Lab in Austin, Texas.

Growth in the number of 3D screens worldwide and the rise in 3D movie releases led to a 69 percent revenue increase to $65.3 million for RealD, according to the company’s fiscal Q2 2011 earnings report, while net loss was $5.1 million, $0.12 per share, compared to a net loss of $5.4 million, $0.22 per share, for the second quarter of fiscal 2010.

In advance of the federal government’s energy efficiency requirements that will result in a phase-out of incandescent light bulbs, starting with 100-watt bulbs in 2012 followed by 75-watt bulbs in 2013 and 60-watt bulbs in 2014, Lutron introduced a new in-wall dimmer that controls the four major residential light types. The dimmer works with halogen, compact fluorescent and LED bulbs, in addition to incandescents, said Michael Maholick, marketing director for Lutron’s Residential Products and Solutions group, who said the company is trying to “stay ahead of the market.”

With tablet PCs and e-readers among the top five gifts expected to ring through cash registers this holiday season, it’s not clear where Barnes & Noble’s $249 Nookcolor e-reader will fall in the mix between sub-$200 e-readers currently on the market and the low-end tablet PCs starting to roll out. Certain to take a hit is Barnes & Noble’s own $149 Wi-Fi Nook and its $199 3G counterpart, which use an E-Ink display, said analyst Ross Rubin of NPD Research. Although the Nookcolor “seems like a stronger competitor to the Kindle” than the original Nook, Rubin said, the “considerable price delta” could limit appeal of the Nookcolor to all but “those hard-core e-reader customers looking for a bit more multimedia capability,” he said.

Verizon will offer 10 3D films to FiOS customers as VOD selections over the next two months, the company said Friday. The first title, Cats & Dogs: Revenge of Kitty Galore, will appear on VOD menus on Nov. 16, and the series ends with Disney’s A Christmas Carol and Step Up 3D in December, Verizon said. The other seven titles are Chicken Little, Bolt and Meet the Robinsons from Disney, and Journey to the Center of the Earth, Under the Sea, Deep Sea and NASCAR from Warner Bros., Verizon said. Prices are being determined, a Verizon spokeswoman told us, saying they'll “likely be a bit higher” than the $5.99 rentals of FiOS HD VOD titles. She said the model will be similar to the one at theaters, where tickets to 3D movies run “a few dollars higher” than tickets to 2D movies. FiOS TV customers will find the 3D movies in two locations, in the High Definition VOD folder under HD 3D and in the Movies VOD folder under 3D movies. The spokeswoman said Verizon will offer additional 3D programming starting early next year, but the specific names of VOD folder titles may change. As to how popular the offer must be for the company to consider it a success, she said, “If we're able to satisfy even one household by offering a 3D film, that’s a success for us.” She said information on the number of FiOS subscribers with 3D TVs was not available. Last year FiOS showed My Bloody Valentine in 3D. This year, the provider showed a New York Yankees-Seattle Mariners game in 3D produced by YES Network, followed by the first 3D NFL game in September between the New York Giants and New England Patriots. Customers have been requesting “more and more 3D programming,” she said, and Verizon has received “a lot of great feedback” from customers about 3D broadcasts.

With lack of content cited as a major bump in the road to consumer adoption of 3D TV, the near-term picture doesn’t offer much relief, according to members of “The TV Story” panel at 3D Media Markets in New York Wednesday. CBS, for one, is looking for help in footing the bill, according to Ken Aagaard, executive vice president of operations and technology for CBS Sports, who said the network is moving “slowly and cautiously” toward 3D.

A handful of films meant to exploit audience interest in 3D, and premium ticket prices, led to consumers’ feeling “ripped off” last summer at 3D theaters, DreamWorks CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg said Wednesday at the 3D Media Markets conference in New York. “The backlash was swift,” he said, saying a line is emerging between high-quality 3D films and those trying to abuse and take advantage of premium pricing for 3D movies.

Xpand is taking pre-orders on its Universal 3D glasses at Amazon with availability expected “in the next week or two,” a company spokesman told us. The glasses will come in one size with multiple nose pieces for adjustment, he said, and use replaceable CR2032 batteries. Introduction of the universal active-shutter glasses, which are said to work with “any 3D-ready display, regardless of brand,” could spark a price war in the active-shutter 3D glasses segment. When we put the Xpand glasses in our Amazon virtual shopping cart, the price showed up as $129.42. We did the same for a pair of Panasonic TY-EW3D1OU 3D glasses. Those glasses came in at $108.88, and within an hour, the price of the Xpand glasses in the cart dropped to $107.67. Samsung SS-G2200AR glasses appeared in the cart at $160.97.

The Wi-Fi Alliance said it has begun certifying products that can make device-to-device connections as Wi-Fi Certified Wi-Fi Direct. Wi-Fi Direct is expected to appear as a proprietary feature in laptops by year-end, and it will have a heavy presence at the 2011 CES, Sarah Morris, marketing manager for the alliance, told Consumer Electronics Daily. She said Wi-Fi Direct functionality will roll out broadly to consumer electronics products in 2011.