Zenith sided with Sony from the very beginning because they felt that the Beta format was superior to the others at the time. At first it was important just to have a Beta to sell because demand and curiosity was running high. It also helped that Sony was making them quality VCRs. As the video market matured Zenith became caught between retaining their quality standards and selling a product at a profit, especially when some of their competition was now coming from the other Beta makers. Zenith decided to start emphasizing recording time with several of their last models only recording in . This strategy ultimately failed. They called it quits even as one model was still in production. The very last Zenith model, the VR 9800 portable, finished its run as the Sony SL-2005.