Nine consumer electronics makers, including Sony, Philips Electronics and Samsung Electronics, are expected to unveil a uniform standard for next-generation DVDs on Tuesday, Japanese media said.
According to the reports, the nine companies have reached a basic agreement on common standards for next-generation recordable DVD machines.
Also slated to attend the briefing are Japan's Hitachi, Matsushita Electric, Pioneer, Sharp, South Korea's LG Electronics and France's Thomson Multimedia.
By reaching a basic agreement, the firms hope to avoid the fragmentation of standards for DVD recorders that has plagued the current line-up.
Toshiba and Matsushita have advocated the DVD-RAM format, while Pioneer and Sharp have teamed up to push the DVD-RW. Sony and Philips have a DVD recordable format of their own.
The next-generation DVD is expected to have a recordable memory size of 30GB, six times current levels, and is likely to hit the market in 2003 or 2004.
News source: CNet News
