Once upon a time Funai sold up to 15 million VCRs annuals, but in 2015 that was down to 750,000 units. The machine literally brought a revolution to home entertainment system approximately 60 years ago.
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The announcement by Funai Electric – the company which manufacturers VCRs in China for Sanyo – that it will not produce any more VHS players after this month indicates the imminent demise of the VCR which revolutionized home entertainment scene almost six decades back.
Parts are too hard to find, apparently.
Funai has been overwhelmed with calls from desperate Japanese VCR tape owners who have not transferred precious recordings of weddings and other special occasions on to other formats, the spokesman added.
To the demise of magnetic tape cassette recorders. However, the format, initially supported by Toshiba and other electronics makers, is most remembered as the loser of a corporate battle over setting the de facto household video standard.
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VCR technology was superseded by DVDs and Blu-Ray and later streaming services such as Netflix as well as on demand services like Sky. Sony stopped making Betamax recorders in 2002, but it kept making tapes for die-hard fans.
