Hollywood says yes to DVD at last

Despite its many setbacks there is still a chance that there will be a DVD player under the Christmas tree for some UK consumers this year.

Distributor Koch Media will take delivery of Toshiba DVD players in the first week of December and an 11th-hour agreement struck with Hollywood studio giants last Tuesday over anti-piracy encryption measures for the players and disks means there will be titles to play on them. The first of these will be the Harrison Ford blockbuster, The Fugitive.

The Toshiba players, first seen in the UK at the last ECTS, will have a street price of u179 inc VAT, said Koch marketing manager Parmindar Uppal. Forward-looking indies have already responded favourably, she said, and Toshiba has run ads in PC and CD-ROM magazines. Koch does not know how many units it will receive from Toshiba before the year end.