Panasonic Blu-ray player due September

Panasonic said on Tuesday that it will start selling a Blu-ray high-definition disc player in September for under $1,500 (£850) and expects up to 5 million of these new DVD players to be sold industrywide in their first year.

"We think adoption will be strong, based on broad support. For the first 12 months, we expect 4 million to 5 million units to be sold beginning in May and across all platforms, including standalones, computers and gaming systems," said Reid Sullivan, vice president of merchandising for Panasonic's entertainment group.

Sullivan said Panasonic sees no need to develop a player to support both Blu-ray and the rival format known as HD DVD, despite a raging war between the two standards and a move to make a dual player for both formats by LG.

"Unfortunately, there is some confusion between the two, but based on the wide support for Blu-ray in the industry, we expect the growth curve to be quite steep. We recognise that it's best to have one format," Sullivan said.

The arrival of Panasonic's Blu-ray player will coincide around the debut of its new 103-inch flat-screen TV, estimated to cost around $10,000.

"We're introducing technologies that will all tie in together to propel Blu-ray. The flat-panel or plasma TV is the engine pulling the train," Sullivan said.

Panasonic's Blu-ray player will compete against other Blu-ray players from Pioneer, Samsung and Sony as well as players supporting rival HD DVD, championed by Toshiba.

The battle between the two formats has divided Hollywood and the computer industry and is being likened to the Betamax versus VHS war of over 25 years ago, which led to customer confusion and widespread company losses.

While more Hollywood studios and electronics makers have sided with the Blu-ray camp, led by Sony, last autumn Microsoft revived HD DVD when it said would support Toshiba's technology.

Microsoft is expected to introduce an external HD DVD drive that will turn the Xbox 360 into a high-definition DVD player.

Sony's much-anticipated PlayStation 3 console will support Blu-ray and is expected to boost the install base for that format, although Sony recently delayed the worldwide debut of PS3 until early November.

Toshiba last week said it may delay the launch of its HD DVD player from March to mid-April.

By offering discs that have far more capacity than current DVDs, and thus are able to carry high-definition movies, the groups hope to breathe new life into the $24bn home video market.

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