Pacific Media Associates (PMA), the worldwide market information experts on front projectors, has released their findings on the penetration of 3D-capable projectors and their actual usage. These are the first results from their sixth biennial survey of US end users of front projectors.
“Overall, our survey showed quite strong interest in 3D, especially considering the limitations of the current state of the offerings–particularly content–and the myriad budgetary pressures on consumers, K-12 education, and other organisations,” said Dr. William Coggshall, President of Pacific Media Associates. “The penetration of 3D-capable projectors into both consumers’ homes and organisations has increased substantially from the levels we found in our 2009 survey. But their actual use to show 3D content still has a long way to go.”
Current consumer users of 3D-capable products told us that they were already using their TVs and projectors in 3D mode a large portion of the time they were turned on. But perhaps more importantly, their increased interest in watching 3D movies, coupled with the increase in the number of movies available in 3D, has led to non-owning consumers’ increased interest in acquiring a 3D-capable projector or TV.
3D has been heavily touted for use in K-12 classrooms, but PMA’s survey results strongly suggest that it will be some time yet before 3D-capable projectors achieve widespread penetration of this market and perhaps even longer before these projectors are actually used in 3D mode to any meaningful extent. Some early test installations have shown promising results, so there is considerable potential in education for 3D, but manufacturers, dealers, content providers, and the entire 3D ecosystem will need to redouble their efforts to realise that potential.
On the other hand, 3D-capable models have already penetrated organisations (businesses, government, universities, etc.) considerably more than K-12 schools, and these projectors are also actually used in 3D mode a lot more often too. And twice as many non-K-12 organisations as K-12 ones said that 3D capability was an absolute must or very important on the next projector they purchase.
“We also probed the current and intended purchases of 3D glasses and content in our survey,” said Coggshall. “Given how different the penetration of 3D-capable projectors was among our three groups of respondents, we were surprised to find that all groups were willing to pay relatively high prices for content. This willingness should sooner or later stimulate content producers to generate more content, which in turn should lead to increased penetration and use of 3D-capable projectors.”
