And the winner is …Blu-ray!

It seems that the format war between Blu-ray and HD DVD is almost over, taking into account that the world’s largest publisher of DVD titles Time Warner Inc. announced recently it would abandon the HD DVD format for Sony’s Blu-ray technology.

Today, Sony Corp.’s shares edged higher, as a result of Time Warner’s decision. Despite broad market declines in Tokyo shares, Sony seemed tougher than before. On the other hand, Toshiba’s shares fell to a nine-month low. Sony’s rival was fatally hit by Time Warner’s decision, as its hopes to win the battle for high definition DVD technology diminished a lot. Toshiba declined no less than 2.3 percent to 783 Yen, its lowest since March 2007, at the close on the Tokyo Stock Exchange.

According to one of Toshiba’s spokesmen, Keisuke Ohmori, HD DVD’s leading promoter said it was disappointed with Time Warner’s decision. “We will assess the potential impact of this announcement with the other HD DVD partner companies and evaluate potential next steps,” the spokesman said.

But Toshiba’s other “partner companies” seem to get fewer and fewer. According to several other major movies studios’ recent announcements, it appears that Time Warner is not the only one leaving HD DVD and Toshiba. At the Consumer Electronics Show’s news conference from Sunday, New Line Cinema also revealed that in future it would abandon HD DVD for Blu-ray.

In this new context, it seems that the Blu-ray consortium, which includes a wide range of popular entertainment companies such as Sony and Apple, now really has the potential to become the standard for next-generation DVDs.