Electronics market intelligence firm iSuppli issued a report Monday morning that claims 78 million television sets with 3D capability will be sold in the year 2015. "The market so far has been more talk than action," researcher Riddhi Patel wrote in a note accompanying the report. "However, announcements made before and after the 2010 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in January indicate that 3D TV is becoming a reality."
At CES, Patel wrote, Sony, LG, Panasonic and Samsung demonstrated home 3D sets. Other companies showed Blu-ray disc players that played 3D video from standard-sized discs.
For the next couple of years, iSuppli forecasts that only early adopters will spend the average $1,768 price for a 3D set. But it's likely that TV makers will soon start adding 3D support to inexpensive models, rather than keeping it a premium feature. If you can buy a 3D set in five years for, say, $500, iSuppli's forecast for a tenfold increase in the number of sets bought by home viewers in 2015 doesn't seem like a stretch.