Sony to Stop Manufacturing Digital Cinema Projectors

[Helmut Maripuu]

Any other manufacturer that wants to take over Sony cinema projectors for low budget cinemas?

[Marcel Birgelen]

Like I indicated before... not going to happen. Either they spin-off their entire projector business (still somewhat unlikely) or anybody taking over Sony's DCI business faces an unwinnable uphill battle, as with the DCI business alone, you're not going to fund your projector operations:

• The market is just a replacement market now. The remaining players in the industry have years of experience, try to beat that on a budget.
• They already announced to quit the business, a lot of damage has been done, those looking for a new projector are now certainly not looking for a Sony.
• Sony projectors are built on-top of Sony proprietary technology, so you'll dependent on Sony for the display panels or you're going to have to redesign the entire light engine.
• There are currently no more TI-DCI licenses available, so you can't rely on TI's DLP technology either.

[Bruce Cloutier]

I've added the XLSx (MS Excel) file, containing the RS232 commands for the UBP-X1100ES, in a ZIP format (because XLSx can't be uploaded directly) as an attachment to this post. Maybe this is better suited in the "Automation" section in the warehouse though.

Do you guys think it would be worth adding some JNIOR documentation to the "Automation" section in the warehouse? If so, how should we go about it?

During the lockdown the guys have been going through a lot of it and updating it for the Series 4 JNIORs. Sadly, most was stuck in the Series 3 days. Obviously it is all information readily available from us. Knowing to look for it is another thing altogether. I just don't know if the Warehouse is a go-to repository for most of you? I hadn't really thought about it until Marcel called attention. What do you think?

[Frank Cox]

Certainly can't hurt to have it available, in my opinion. Even someone who's "just browsing" might be idly fanning through your manual and see something there that has him warming up the credit card and reaching for the phone, so the more access you can provide the better it is for you as well.

[Bruce Cloutier]

Frank, It would be for support purposes. I am not trying to market the things. You know, I am a cynic too. People thinking that I am a greedy bastard gets seriously in the way of us trying to make the best product that we can and in making sure that customers are happy. Mostly people do not read manuals. And even I have trouble finding them on our own site sometimes. That is regardless of whether or not we've written them in any useful form. Meanwhile you all have already bought these things and really don't know what more you can do without spending another dollar. We rely on the product selling itself. And, really we need to move it into other completely different markets if I were investing anything in sales and marketing. It wouldn't make sense for me to pay so much attention to all of you here.

By the way, right now there is no one answering our phones. Our offices are deserted and there will probably be no activity in there for another month. Amy stops in when we get a rare order to ship. So I am not even thinking about trying to push anyone into spending anything. I am sure that you have other priorities. We are just trying to survive just like the rest of all of you.

Sorry... Off topic.

Also, Frank, I know that you weren't insinuating that sales was my only motivation.

[Marcel Birgelen]

I think it would be good to have them in the warehouse, marketing value aside or not, the convenience factor is more important in my opinion.

And hey, there is no shame into indirectly marketing your products, if you offer something that's worth the value and actually gets the job done for those looking for it... It's something different than putting out an unsolicited sales pitch.

[Leo Enticknap]

Agreed with Marcel that "there is no shame into indirectly marketing your products." I've done that, too, when I've seen a query or problem, for which an MiT product is a possible solution (or part of one). Everyone running a movie theater is a buyer of products and services that are needed to operate that business. For the vendors of those products and services to focus on sites where their customers (actual or potential) are likely to be found strikes me as simple common sense. It's not like the unsolicited emails for "male enhancement" products, or notifications that we've inherited millions from a recently deceased uncle in Port Harcourt we didn't know we had, of which we all receive dozens of every day.

[Bruce Cloutier]

And hey, there is no shame into indirectly marketing your products, if you offer something that's worth the value and actually gets the job done for those looking for it... It's something different than putting out an unsolicited sales pitch.

Yeah I know. Frank obviously struck a nerve. It's a topic for another forum. No need to expand here.

How does stuff get into the Warehouse? I wasn't aware of it until you mentioned it. That's my bad.

[Carsten Kurz]

I think you simply email it to Brad.

[Frank Cox]

I actually intended that to be a positive thing, not a negative in any way.

I also hang around a piano playing forum where, among the rest of us rabble, there are a few people who work for the various digital piano companies in various capacities. It's not uncommon for someone there to say, "I wonder if my piano model X can do this", "Does anyone know of a piano that can do Y" or "How can I fix this when that part fell off" and have someone from one of the manufacturers chime in and answer their question. I don't think anyone considers that to be crass marketing in any way, it's more like good customer support and it's a valuable resource for anyone with one or who's considering getting one. And if Roland or Korg or Casio get to sell a few more pianos that way, then more power to them in my opinion.

[Bruce Cloutier]

We're good Frank. Really. No problem. I really didn't mean to hijack this topic.

I was finding the Sony bashing quite interesting. The whole concept of dropping a huge product from your line and all of the logistics in doing that makes me think. I wonder what that ultimately costs? Then the question is why? Are they admitting that their product is substandard? Did they fail in competing? Do they think the future is LED? Were they losing money with the product? How do you phase out of it and not piss off their customer base? What do you do with the people employed on that line? What about all the production equipment? In-process inventory? Real estate commitments? On and on...

I wonder if someone at the top is going to get a huge bonus for having the insight to drop that part of the business? I can't fathom having to make such a decision. You have to be somewhat detached from the details (and some level of reality) to do that I would think. It doesn't seem like any of those here are concerned. That says something.

How much did COVID-19 play into this decision? Probably quite a bit?

[Carsten Kurz]

As far as I know, that decision was made before SARS-CoV-2 turned out to become a problem.Someone told me about these rumors already around the end of last year. And I know one Sony digital cinema executive who left the company at the same time and signed with a competitor.

It could be a day long conversation about the why and how. Essentially, we will never know what drives a company like Sony to do what they do. They built an excellent DCI system, where in my opinion, some minor disadvantages have been more than compensated for by explicit strengths in other areas of the product. Which made it a great competition and alternative to the TI/DLP monoculture. Most if not all of the bashers here have never worked with a Sony projector.

One key aspect certainly is that they kept everything closed - and they never developed a culture of customer contact and competition awareness as we know it from essentially all 'western' companies in the cinema market. Never did one of their staff turn up on a forum or turned towards a user/client directly (except for some very rare special cases). They were never interested in customer relations, they were not interested in improving their product featurewise by looking at the competition (well, aside from that initial 'we do 4k') or the actual needs of their users.
'Buy it! Use it! If you want something more, wait until we offer a new product!' Sony does the same in many or most of the other markets they 'service'.
It is a cultural thing as well, I think. I see that way of doing business in many asian companies. e.g. I can see in the Sony manuals that they have not been written or at least been worked over by native english speakers.

- Carsten

[Steve Guttag]

I can say, from the onset, Sony was VERY "put-off-ish" to us. They pretty much took the position of "go-away" we don't need you. Okay...I'm sure NEC, Christie and Barco will keep us occupied! And you know what? They did! Sony drew first-blood on the poor relationship. I'm not saying that Sony's product isn't without merit but they catered to a business model that we didn't fit into well. Furthermore, their product seems to be very service-intensive (needs constant attention) and without a service contract gets expensive to keep up with.

I believe one of the articles alludes to that their extended warranty that covers expensive imaging parts causes the plan to run at a loss.

I'm sure another issue is that the cinema market, historically, is a tiny market. It was only artificially big when EVERY theatre HAD to buy new digital projectors. But now we are back to the scattered new-builds and replacement through attrition. It is a small market. Too small for the likes of Sony.

I suspect that had their product had laser light early, (and they could keep costs in line), that they would have done better and been able to attain good light levels. And now that the lasers are finally coming down in price, their technology should be cheaper, in the long run (LCoS).

[Carsten Kurz]

Yes, that probably was the biggest issue with their market entry - they never understood that digital cinema is an integrator business. Barco understood this right away and went with Kinoton at first. Sony tried to keep everything within their Broadcast/Pro division and gave a shit about the established cinema dealer/support networks. They also preferred big chain deals.

[Marco Giustini]

In my personal experience Sony also developed tools and procedure to maintain the picture quality too late. At least where I live, Sony machines were left to degrade for years before PCAB was introduced. And when that happened it was a bit late with some exhibitors requesting a change of the optical block instead of just recalibrating it.

Most of their most brilliant solutions had some crucial flaws that made using/implementing them a nightmare. Thinking of the PCAB, the RS232 connectivity! Seriously? Suddenly you had to spend time running cables to connect the camera in the auditorium. Or the huge and cumbersome arm to place the light sensor in front of the lens! The hole system could have been easily re-designed to be much more practical and easy to use.