Netflix back Blu-ray exclusively

News - Rental firm dropping HD-DVD

American online rental site Netflix are to cease offering customers HD-DVD rentals because they believe that Blu-ray has now emerged as the indisputable leader of the next-gen DVD field.

Netflix state that their catalogue of HD-DVD releases will be fazed out within a year, while the firm will focus on expanding their range of Blu-ray flicks.

"The prolonged period of competition between the two formats has prevented clear communication to the consumer regarding the richness of the high-def experience versus standard definition," content boss Ted Sarandos offered.

"We're now at the point where the industry can pursue the migration to a single format, bring clarity to the consumer and accelerate the adoption of high-def.

"Going forward, we expect that all of the studios will publish in the Blu-ray format and that the price points of high-def DVD players will come down significantly. These factors could well lead to another decade of disc-based movie watching as the consumer's preferred means."

Netflix also operate the UK's Love Film service and offer seven million subscribers 90,000 movies.

Warner's decision to exclusively support Blu-ray was regarded as the death blow to HD-DVD - with even staunch allies like Microsoft suggesting they may support Blu-ray in the future.

This news is taken from our sister site tech.tm.