Following the release of its Dh99,999 84” 4K LED TV in September last year, Sony today announced the expansion of its 4K TV line-up with the launch of the more affordable 65-inch and 55-inch screen sizes.
The smaller siblings of the 84-inch giant high-resolution TV will be retailed in UAE from June 20 onwards, Sony announce at a media gathering at the Armani Hotel this afternoon.
The new range of Sony Bravia 4K TVs will be available starting Dh19,999 for the 55-inch variant and Dh29,999 for the 65-inch variant.
Vishesh Bhatia, CEO of Jumbo Electronics, which will sell the TVs in the UAE through their network of stores as well as partners, told Emirates 24|7 that the retailer had sold 50 units of the 84-inch Dh99,999 TV in the UAE since the giant TV began retailing in the country in mid-November last year.
When quizzed further on the demographic profile of the buyers of the Dh99,999 TV in the UAE, Bhatia said: “It’s an even split between Asians and the rest of the world. Indians are big buyers of the 84-inch TV.”
Hiroyasu Sugiyama, Managing Director, Sony Middle East and Africa, added that the Middle East has emerged as the biggest market outside of Sony’s home market of Japan for its 84-inch TV, with more of the Dh99,999 TVs sold in the region than in the US or China or anywhere else in the world.
“The UAE was one of the key contributors to this record sale. I would like to thank all our customers for this,” Sugiyama said. “While sales greatly exceeded our expectations, we realise that an 84-inch television is not for everyone,” he added. The same could be said about the price-tag of Dh99,999, in which one can buy a mid-sized sedan car here on the UAE.
“We would like to extend the joy of owning this amazing Sony 4K experience to a much wider range of customer base and I am tremendously excited to introduce the new 65-inch and 55-inch Sony 4K LED televisions that will deliver the stunning 4K viewing experience at a more accessible price point,” he added.
Jumbo’s Bhatia added that the retailer has high hopes from the “more affordable” versions of the 84-inch TV, which goes on sale later this month.
The company will running an introductory campaign for the first month of the TVs’ availability in the UAE, bundling the 65-inch TV with the Sony Xperia Z smartphone and the intelligent remote at the same price, or the 55-inch TV with the Sony PS3 at the same price.
According to Sony, featuring four times the resolution of Full HD (3,840 x 2,160 pixels), the 4K series delivers the most immersive home entertainment experience, with the highest picture quality regardless of the content or source.
Sony officials said that viewers will not be troubled by the pixels and will enjoy the viewing experience even when seated as close as 1.5 meters from the screen – a feature that is possible only through the hitherto-unavailable 4K technology.
When asked if there was such high-definition content available through satellite channels for customers to justify their purchases of these high-end TVs, Sony officials maintain that Sony’s proprietary ‘4K X-Reality Pro’ processor ‘up-scales’ the content to “near 4K quality.”
“Any presently available content like movies, TV programs, photos and games can be up-scaled to beautiful 4K picture quality by Sony’s proprietary ‘4K X-Reality Pro’ high picture quality engine,” Sony said in a media statement.
“This deploys picture enhancement chips that can upscale any 2K content like Blu-Ray or DVD to 4K. The up-scaling capability of the BRAVIA 4K TV is a first-of-its-kind in the industry and a unique customer benefit from Sony,” the company noted.
“This engine is capable of reproducing any content with different resolutions, such as movies, internet content, photographs and games, into stunningly crisp, high-quality images with 4K resolution, allowing consumers to watch 4K content anytime,” it added.
In addition, these TVs incorporate Sony’s magnetic fluid speakers and digital signal processing technology that the company claims delivers smooth midrange, lower vibration and deep bass.
While Sony doesn’t call it range of 4K LED TVs as smart TVs, “as some of our competitors do,” this range of TVs is indeed Internet-enabled and provide seamless connectivity with mobile devices.
“To further enhance the enjoyment of beautiful, fully immersive picture and sound, the Bravia X series are Wi-Fi enabled and offer a wide range of Internet connected services including Sony’s smart connect solutions, enabling cross-device connectivity between mobile devices and their TV. In addition, smart connect features such as one-touch mirroring provides greater control and additional content options by interconnecting media sources across the home and mobile entertainment ecosystem.”
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