The Birth of the Vcr Industry

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54 RICHARD 5. ItfJSItNlt l.00M & MIC l/t l'L 1. CUSUMM(J

the birth of the YCIt mass iiiarket iii 1975. Persistent technical effsrt, infor+efl by the lessons of tailed iono atioiis, ultimately yielded a design syiitlicsis well iniitclied to the n•.cds of the mas' market. Rival innovators then vied to establish competitive ailvaotagc for the highly pro£talile growth stage of a new in‹iustry.

This rcw industry, .«nually yicl‹liiig its participants billions or dollars of revenues in the mid-1080s, began with the coiiinicrci.iliiation of Sony's lIetam.tx’ in l9’/5. JVC, ivitlist.mding prcssiire to adopt u common standard, introduced the rnaI 91 IS’ systcin in 197fi. fly 1977, sever other Japanese firms were mai’£etiug VCIt• tamer license from Sony or JHC. Uorl4U4e consumer demand passed the million-Ull t CVel lh 1978 and doubled annually during the five years l9?6--b1.’ When growth hegaii tu slow in the mid-80s, deiiiaod exceeded 30 million units annually.

TECHNOLOGICAI. OltIGINS AND

STll/\TGGIC INlTiATlYES

In l9!i1, I)avid Samoff, tlliairinan of ItCh, had challenged lits engineers to develop a video iecor‹ler within five year’s,'" J’li‹i ItCA teaiii focused on a machine that moment a narrow tiiJie at very high speeds past fixcd magnetic heads. Meanwhile, in tlic centrist r‹!scarcli lalioriitoi ies ofJ’osliiba, one of Japan's largest electrical eqiiipiiient and electronics finns, Dr. Norikazu Sawazaki, a young cngiiiccr assigned to work: with NIJK, the

japanese liroadta sii*g • i›,l,i„'y. » s• •"°e"iook (faith scant resources) to

invert a videorecorilcr. He tried a ‹different app cacti, in which the recording

head rotated at high speed while the tape unveil past at a relatively slow pace. because the tape path reseintiled a helix, the ‹leeice caiiie to he cated a “helical scanner.“ In 1054, Saivaiaki filetl the first patents for lbs new scanner."

Irnovation— hut the first coiiiiiiei‘cially iinpoi’tant videorecoider was ci‘eated by a smell team tit /tnipcx Coi’poi‘ation iii Rcihvood City, Califor- nia." 4’liis revolutionary machine ciiiploycd a “t ransvci se scanner," iii which four iecoi‘diog heads on a rapiilly rotating denim scanned across a tz'o-inch-wide tape.“ ’the tii‘st puhlic éeinoiistrati(iii of the Annex ATR, in March 1956, stunned a convention of television bi oailcastcrs. ’the ma- chine embodied patented technology ivit11‹iut which it appeared ini iractical to build a competitive Y’l’lt. Ott /tnipex's management soon tcgan to share its technical iiionopoly. ’l’lie desire to utter a color recorder led tt› a cross-licensing a¿reetnent with ltC/t, which contrtilleil color’l’7 patents. f'earful theo thai the giant ItCA ivoiilil lie first to introduce a transistorized 9TiI, Ainpex began to collabofate faith Suny iii development of solid-state circuitry foi videorecoréing, intending t lier•hy also to gain access to the Japanese market."

At thiit time, demand front broa‹lcastei s f‹.r Y’l’Rs «as booniir$, despite

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”IHE OIRTH OF TUE VCR lNf UhTRI 55

.p ‹J r‹p ,0t1tl price tag on the machines.' But there was no sign that other users w‹›uld be interested in products based on the transverse scs»oer, with its inherent complexity and cost. Nonetheless, some speculated about the ;iro!ipetts for a u ass market, anticipating uses of YTRs that would becoiiie commonplace' in the 1980s. For example, in the aftemath u1 Annex's tirst public i'emoiistrations, one reporter quoted George Long, then president of Ainpex, suggestin;¡that

evcntua3y they (Y’f RsJ iiiight bt mass-pr‹xIuted for home use by persons who mist

to sec a program over and over again or want it retorted during their absence."

/t few days !otei a reporter elaborateil:

A more visiona‹’y project is the thought of ii home recorder and playback for taped J’7 pictur: \' liy not pitk up the new full-length motion picture at the correr drugstorc and tlien run it through one's hoiic TV receiver?"

flefining Strategic Roles

E»gi«eers at Ainpex and in Japan opened the patl› to development of a Y 1'R foi the » asses whei› they con›bi»ed the helical scaivier co»ceyt Mth other ele» e»ts of the successful br‹›adcast recor‹ler. Some engineers at RCA, Toshiba, and Arnpex saw the potential for developing that technology, but top managers incachfirmdeci‹Jed to focus videocfforts on the broadcast market. Thc o/›/›nrtunity inherent in the new design synthesis Seas most clearly j›er«eive‹I, instead, t›y three ‹›tIier fi‹ms—]YC, Sony, and Matsu- shita—that consequently became vi‹leo pioneers after 1957.

ltCA—At ttCA in 19.56, the er;;ineer who had headed their unsuccessful attempt to build a broadcast YTR bI!1ievéd it was possible to reduce the size of the Axed-head macldne end build a “home television magnetic-tape p!ayei’." hut senior corporate exe‹iitives were preoccupied instead by challenges front dries such as Benn.li, 4’exas Instruments, and ISM in busine:uses far more important to the company's welfare at the time." ltCA's leadeisliip in televisi‹in ieceiier manufacbJre was under cha£enge by a creative iienith rnarhetUl@ Strdttl,p. Meanwhile, the new semiconduc-

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sane time, the sale of electronic commenters was bccom»ig a major industry, catching RCA by surprise. Management Penetrated work on consumer applications of videorecordin$ in 19!›8. It was not unto the early I.970s that RIBA attempteil (aboi’tively) to innovate again in ¥TR design.

Toshilia—ln J'okyo in 19o0, Sai azaI‹i of Toshiba demoo•!rated a working prototype of a V’fR with helical scanner, stimulating widespread uitei‘e.!.‘ Soon attemaré, a Japanese newspaper concluded that ”the development of the ATR may change the world. P‹•rhaps we «liculd say that completion of I.lie initial piototype