Canon To Enter TV Market With Displays

Japanese camera and copy-machine maker Canon Inc. plans to enter the TV business as soon as next year by manufacturing thin displays in a new joint venture with Toshiba Corp., a Japanese electronics company, the latest in a wave of entries into the blossoming market.

Canon and Toshiba have been working together since 1999 to develop a next-generation display called SED, or surface-conduction electron-emitter displays, and plans to set up a joint venture in 2004 to mass-produce such displays, Canon spokesman Bunji Yano said Thursday.

The SED display emits light on its own and doesn't require the back lighting of today's liquid crystal displays. It also uses less power than plasma displays popular for large screen monitors. Imagery on SED is also expected to be brighter and clearer than current displays.

The Nihon Keizai Shimbun, Japan's top business daily, reported Thursday that SED televisions will be manufactured under both the Canon and Toshiba brands. Initially they will be sold mainly overseas, taking advantage of Canon's brand image in digital cameras and office equipment, it said.

Toshiba announced recently it will stop making cathode ray tubes for TVs in Japan, and the newspaper report said the CRT plant will likely be used to make the new displays. But both companies denied the report as speculation, saying details were still being worked out with Toshiba.

Like Japanese electronics and entertainment giant Sony Corp., Toshiba has fallen behind rivals such as Sharp Corp. in LCD and plasma TVs and hopes to play catch up with SED TVs. Dell Inc. and Gateway Inc. have also entered the TV market with thinner displays, heating up the competition.

Copyright 2003 Associated Press. All rights reserved.

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