Interview: ‘Growth of Bravia’s OLED segment has been phenomenal,’ Sony India MD

When it comes to premium televisions, Sony’s Bravia range is a name that easily comes to mind. Its OLED range is considered the best in the premium TV segment. And Sony has been expanding its offering in the Indian market as demand for more larger, better TV screens continues to grow. The Bravia brand itself has evolved and now offers some of the top technology that one can find in a television. Sunil Nayyar, MD, Sony India explained to over email what the Bravia brand brings to the table. Below is an edited version of the interview.
Q) How has Sony seen growth for OLEDs in India in the past two years?
Overall, the growth of Bravia’s OLED segment has been phenomenal. The pandemic itself and with it, the rise in OTT content consumption created a shift towards large screen televisions. Technologies like XR OLED, 3D surround sound, Dol Vision Atmos, IMAX Enhanced and Netflix Calibrated are now household names. Sony will keep setting benchmarks with such industry-first tech innovation in coming years, especially due to the increase in sales for large screen premium televisions.
Q) When it comes to a premium Sony OLED TV, what should users expect on the display side?
Both premium series A80K and MASTER Series A95K OLEDs in Sony’s 2022 lineup have a new type of high luminance panel that works in conjunction with the XR processor to allow more light output. Sony’s new MASTER Series OLED will give an even bigger boost in colour brightness of up to 200 per cent compared to conventional OLED technology.
Q) How important is audio in the Bravia experience? How is Sony ensuring that users get a top-notch audio experience on this front?
Bravia XR OLEDs are equipped with Acoustic Surface Audio＋ sound, where the television screen itself is the speaker and both the picture and sound are in complete harmony. This uses special actuators to turn the screen into a multi-channel speaker. The sound precisely matches the screen, with pictures and sound in total sync for a truly immersive experience.
Sunil Nayyar, MD, Sony India.
All Bravia XR models feature 3D Surround Upscaling. This virtually creates surround sound from the sides and vertically using just the television speakers, so one can experience 3D audio. Another feature is the Acoustic Centre Sync. When one connects a Bravia XR TV to a Sony soundbar, the soundbar reinforces the centre speaker channel for clearer and fuller vocals.
Then there is Sound Auto Calibration for left/right balance adjustment. Bravia Cam follows the viewer and their position, even if they are watching from the side, the television itself adjusts left and right sound balance for optimum acoustics. Another key feature is Sound Auto Calibration – Auto Voice Zoom. detecting the viewing dance, Bravia Cam can adjust voice zoom automatically so that one can hear each dialogue. The volume of the television increases when one moves away from the television and decreases when one gets closer.
Q) What is the Bravia XR processor? How does it boost performance on Sony TVs?
The newly introduced Bravia XR offers the most immersive experience through vision and sound. The processor on Sony Bravia XR TVs reproduces content the way humans see and hear for an incredibly lifelike experience. It understands how the human eye focuses, cross-analysing images to give real-life depth, extraordinary contrast and beautifully vivid colours.
It can cross-analyse hundreds of thousands of elements at once. One of these elements is the focal point, which can detect where humans tend to focus the most. Cross-analysing each picture element, including the focal point, generates depth information and adjusts each part to give the picture the most depth and reality.