US loses big TV deal

Discussion in 'Business & Economics' started by Billy T, Mar 9, 2006.

  1. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

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    Not yet official (That is waiting for president Lula to return from state visit to london) but Brazil has chosen its digital TV system after several years of technical study and deal making.

    Japan won, Europe's system placed second, and US's system was third. All of S. American will follow Brazil's choice. Reasons (also unofficial) for selecting Japan:

    (1) Japan's system was favored by local broadcasters and this is a presidential election year. (Not politically wise to anger the TV companies was part of reason.)
    (2) Japan offered in its deal 2 billions of investment in Brazil to produce plasma displays and semiconductors in new plants.
    (3) US has earned (under GWB) a lot of dislike and this was part of the reason.

    All existing analog TV will require conversion boxes and new TV's sold will soon be digital, using the Japanese system. I guess it will be about 50 billion dollar deal over the next decade as S. America goes digital TV.
     
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  3. G. F. Schleebenhorst England != UK Registered Senior Member

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    There's apparently a lot of Japanese immigrants in Brazil.

    Everyone hates the USA.

    With the exception of computing for some reason that I could never understand, american electronics are crap.

    Japanese electronics are second to none.
     
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  5. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

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    Day later update:

    President Lula not happy about advanced leak of infro says "not decided" and that he may even "delay decision" (not anounce tomorrow,10 feb, when he returns from Europe/London.)

    Europe very upset with choice of Japanese digital TV system. Argues that 74 countries use their's (DVB pattern) vs only Japan for the ISDB pattern. - 6 major european companies, all complaining. Also argue that Japan will not actually give 2 billion dollars in plants and technical help to Brazil, etc. (May be truth to this as the offer signed by Japanese manufactures/ TV association (ARIB) only committes them to seriously consider and study the building of factories in Brazil.)

    US system (ATSC) all (except Americans) agree is a technically inferior technology. Technical advatage of ISDB is that it works well for moving receivers, like small cell phone displaying TV etc. Technical advatage of ISDB is that it permits more content to be packed into same bandwidth - more important in Europe where many national stations all want to broadcast in parallel. Both give 1080 by 1920 pixels display, (much better than analog TV and I think better than the Americian digital system also.)

    Not only is this a big loss for US balance of trade, but also another indication that US is losing technological leadership it once enjoyed.(Many americans like to think the world still needs them and only low cost foreign labor is causing all their electrodomestics, digital cameras, etc. to be imported.) The truth is that often foreign technology is better now.

    For example, no US firm has quality control or know how to make even a third generation flat panel display. Japan is now bringing generation five to market! (1080 x1920 = 2,073,600pixels) I.e. More than 2 billion pixels must all work. For economic reasons, no more than 1% of production run displays can be discarded because of a failed pixel. Thus, pixel failure rate must be less than one in two hundred million. - US has not been able to achieve this, even in generation three.

    Robot technology is much more advanced in Asia, even thought currently labor costs are lower. Japan demonstrated a robot that can walk while playing a buggle about a year ago. US is not even close. etc.

    Once US cars were the best in world. Now even those made in Brazil, with "flex fuel" technology, etc. are more advanced. I challenge all to name a technically area where US is the unquestioned leader, either in hardware of soft ware. Not only is GM going down for the count now, but so will WinTell, MS etc in about a decade. Most important thing in fixing this, is to recognize the need, not deny it.

    US has a lot of good agricultural land. If America does not wake up to the facts soon, America will be only an agricultural supplier to Asia, not a technical center. In this role American must compete with Brazil and others (who have good land, plenty of rain, longer growing seasons, etc.) To compete American wages will need to be the same. That is not the future I want for my grandchildren, all living in the US, but seems to be Americ's destiny unless it wakes up to reality soon.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Mar 9, 2006
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  7. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

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    Yes, I live in Sao Paulo, which is probably 3 or 4th largest city in world (About same as Mexico city,but growing more rapidly and 3d, rather than 4th, is probably true now.) One very large district has all signs in stores etc only in Japanese. It is reported to be the second largest concentrations of Japanese in world, behind only Toyko. When I go there to buy items for the wok, I must point or take it myself, and my Portuguese is not that bad. - They just do not need it in the Japanese district.
     
  8. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

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    Just picked up the HP Pavilion I am typing on to see bottom. You guessed it. It was made in China. I already knew China was world's largest maker of computers, cell phones, digital cameras, etc. and that many are designed there. I made a post about Chinese designed cell phones, how they are PDAs, internet browsers, cameras etc, but what really struck me is that some even dispense perfume from a rechargable mini tank!
     

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