Sony Corp said on Wednesday it was open to discussions to create a single standard for the next generation of DVD discs, a move which could head off the looming threat of a major format war among the world"s biggest technology companies. "From the point of view to provide the best service to the consumer one format is better than two. We"re open to discussions," Yukinori Kawauchi, general manager in charge of the next DVD format at Sony"s Video Group, said in an interview.
But he added that specific proposals had yet to be tabled. "There"s no visible progress to do that (create a single standard)," Kawauchi told Reuters at an event organized by Sony. The electronics industry is facing a battle between the so-called Blu-ray optical discs and HD DVD discs, two different new DVD formats which offer higher capacity than current DVDs.