"..Purveyors of CD and DVD-ROM drives won't have a tough time selling more products in 2000, but they will have a tough time making more money, according to a new report. International Data Corp. issued a new forecast for the optical and removable drive market today that predicts a 24 percent rise in shipments of DVD drives and the like. However, revenues will lag shipment growth by a significant margin--drive makers will only eke out a 2 percent increase over 1999 results, the report said.

The best hope for growing revenues is to target the rewritable CD (CD-RW) or DVD-ROM market, judging by the forecast. IDC expects the market for CD-RW drives to grow by 93 percent this year and for DVD-ROM drives to grow by 55 percent. Once promoted as a technology that would help advance the PC against the TV as an entertainment device, DVD-ROM has made a slower than expected incursion into the PC market, a situation that may only start to change this year. DVD-ROM offers much more capacity--up to 8.5GB per side--than its predecessor, the 650MB CD-ROM.."