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SanDisk and Music Companies To Offer Digital Music
Fecha de publicación: 9/22/2008
SanDisk, which last week turned down a $5.9 billion acquisition offer from Samsung Electronics.

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Owners of MP3 players and microSD-enabled phones will soon be able to listen to their favorite tunes without Digital Rights Management issues, passwords, or even an Internet connection.

SanDisk, together with Sony, Universal and Warner Bros., has developed microSD cards called slotMusic cards with "more stuff in less space." The new cards will allow users to listen to preloaded music, videos and images from Sony, Universal, Warner Bros. and EMI.

SanDisk, which last week turned down a $5.9 billion acquisition offer from Samsung Electronics, has not yet made the cards or announced pricing. Carmella Lyman, a company spokesperson, said the cards will be available before the holidays in the U.S. on the Internet and at retail stores, including Best Buy and Wal-Mart. The cards will be available in Europe soon after they are offered in the U.S.

SanDisk chose two of the top three music retailers according to a consumer survey by NPD Group that included CDs and digital music downloads.

Daniel Schreiber, senior vice president and general manager of SanDisk, said the company has been innovative for decades and was at the forefront of replacing chemical film with digital film, and floppy disks with USB drives.

"Now, with billions of hosts already in consumers' hands, slotMusic launches into an install base that few formats ever achieve," Schreiber said. "Plus, its portability, openness and penetration into the mobile space are a perfect complement for the music industry."

"This form of music delivery is perfectly suited for today's mobile consumer," said Thomas Hesse, president of global digital business and U.S. sales for Sony BMG Music Entertainment. "It's unique, hassle-free entertainment that slots easily into a large number of mobile phones."

Tuning Into New Features

The slotMusic cards will include a USB sleeve so they can be used with all computers, including Windows, Linux and Mac. Also with mobile phones from Verizon Wireless, Sprint, Motorola, Samsung, Pharos and Nokia.

The cards have 1GB of capacity and music will be played at 320 Kbps, according to SanDisk.

Owners of the slotMusic cards can also add their own content, including videos, songs and album art, according to SanDisk.

Market Potential

SanDisk's announcement comes as analysts are predicting a slowdown in the mobile-phone market but strong growth in smartphones and MP3 players. While the mobile-phone market in the U.S. was down 13 percent in the second quarter to 28 million units, sales of smartphones reached nine million from January through July, an increase of 84 percent year over year, according to NPD Group. Consumers bought $6.3 billion worth of MP3s in 2007.

Mike Jbara, executive vice president for Warner Music Group, said the company is excited to offer its artists' music in a new format. "WMG has been at the forefront of developing, supporting and promoting new ways to offer consumers music in the online, mobile and physical spaces, and slotMusic is a creative solution."

Having top music companies like Warner and Sony is huge, but SanDisk has to compete with major music-offering competitors, including Apple with its iTunes Store and Amazon.com, which offers digital downloads.

Consumers downloaded one billion songs from the iTunes Store in 2003 (when it first launched) to 2006, according to Apple. By June this year, Apple announced the iTunes Store had hit a milestone of five billion downloads.

Fuente: Yahoo.com/News
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