Since manufacturers of blue laser diodes are still unable to improve yield rates, the shortage may result in pushing back the competition between Blu-ray Disc (BD) and HD-DVD optical disc drives in the market to the first quarter of 2007, according to sources at optical disc drive (ODD) manufacturers. Although several vendors, including Royal Philips Electronics, Hitachi-LG Data Storage (HLDS), Sony, Matsushita Electric, Lite-On IT and BenQ, already announced BD or HD-DVD drives, only Pioneer and Plextor are currently able to maintain actual shipments, according to the sources.

More here at DigiTimes.