Matsushita Electric, SanDisk and Toshiba to Form SD Association to Promote Next Generation SD Memory Card

Business Wire, Jan 6, 2000

Business Editors & High-tech Writers

CES 2000

LAS VEGAS--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jan. 6, 2000

More than 100 Market-Leading Companies Expected to Join the

Association to Enable New Digital Consumer Products and Internet

Applications

Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd. (NYSE:MC), best known by its Panasonic brand name, SanDisk Corporation (Nasdaq:SNDK) and Toshiba Corporation announced today that a new industry-wide association will be created to set industry standards for the SD (Secure Digital) Memory Card and promote its wide acceptance in digital applications.

The announcement was made at a press conference at the CES trade show.

The new organization, named the SD Association (SDA), will be headquartered in California and its executive membership will include some 30 world-leading high-tech companies and major content companies. Initial SDA membership is expected to include approximately 100 companies from around the world covering diverse industries including consumer electronics, information processing, telecommunications, entertainment and software.

Thus far, 71 companies have stated they plan to join the SDA as members. The companies that plan to join the association as executive members are: Alpine Electronics Inc., ARM Inc., Audible Inc., Canon Inc., Casio Computer Co. Ltd., Compaq Computer Corp., Diamond Multimedia/S3, Eastman Kodak Co., EMI, Hewlett Packard Co., IBM Corp., Kenwood Corp., LG Electronics Inc., Liquid Audio Inc., Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. Ltd., Microsoft Corp., Micronas Intermetall GmbH, Mitsubishi Electric Corp., Motorola, NEC Corp. (Cellular Phone), Olympus, Onkyo Corp., QUALCOMM, RealNetworks Inc., Samsung Electronics Corp. Ltd., SanDisk Corp., Sharp Corp., Socket Communications Inc., Symbian Ltd., TDK Corp., Toyota Motor Corp., Toshiba Corp., Universal Music Group and Victor Co. of Japan Ltd.

The companies planning to join the SDA as general members are: Alps Electric Co. Ltd., Altec Computersysteme GmbH Ltd., AVX Corp., Clarion Co. Ltd., e.Digital Corp., Eiger Labs Inc., FCI Japan Co. Ltd., Hirose Electric Co. Ltd., Hitachi Maxell Ltd., Honda Tsushin Kogyo Co. Ltd., Hosiden Corp., Innogear Inc., InterTrust Technologies Corp., Iriso Electronics Co. Ltd., Japan Aviation Electronics Industry, Ltd., J.S.T.NFG. Co. Ltd., Kyocera Elco Corp., LinkUp Systems Corp., Matsushita Electric Works Ltd., MediaQ Inc., Molex Inc., Molex Japan Co. Ltd., Next Audio Inc., Pontis, RioPort.Com, SCM Microsystems Inc., Silicon Storage Technology Inc., SmartDisk Corp., Taiko Denki Co. Ltd., Texas Instruments, Tokyo Electron Co. Ltd., Tomita Traders Co. Ltd., TYCO Electronics EC, Yamaichi Electronics Co. Ltd., Yokowo Co. Ltd., and Zoran Corp.

The first general meeting of the association is tentatively scheduled for the end of January, 2000. The association aims to establish technical and specification standards for the SD Memory Card applications, promote the next generation memory card to make it widely used in the industry through standardization, and encourage development of products in the field of digital A/V equipment and digital information network equipment.

Last August, Matsushita, SanDisk and Toshiba announced agreement on a comprehensive collaboration to jointly develop, specify and widely promote a next generation secure memory card called the SD Memory Card. With a physical profile of 24mm x 32mm x 2.1mm, which is as tiny as a postage stamp, the new card will provide both an SDMI-compliant (Secure Digital Music Initiative), high-level of copyright protection and high-density memory capacity. The three companies have worked closely with a variety of interested parties to encourage participation in the card standard and have generated extremely strong support from key industry companies.

"Matsushita Electric believes that the SD Memory Card is a vital link to the digital future," said Yoichi Morishita, president of Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd. "The establishment of the SD Association with membership drawn from some of the world's leading technology and music companies is a major step toward the goal of making SD a de-facto storage standard. With this vision in mind, we expect to develop and produce a wide range of SD Memory Card-based Panasonic products, including not only audio, video, mobile communications and PC applications but also information appliance products. When we have a single compatible memory card that can be used in products from PCs to Internet music players, the biggest beneficiary will be the consumer."

Eli Harari, CEO and president of SanDisk, said, "The tremendous interest in the SD Memory Card by such a broad base of global corporations in the four months since its introduction is completely without precedent. We believe that the formation of the SDA as a standards organization open to all will further accelerate acceptance of the SD Memory Card as the universal storage media for portable, wireless and Internet market applications. Already there are more than 50 companies that have stated they plan to join the SDA, including the leading manufacturers and content providers in consumer audio/video, digital imaging, Internet, communications and wireless, personal computers and PDAs, automotive, and other key markets in the information age. This success is a testimony to the strong cooperation established between Matsushita, Toshiba and SanDisk as the founding members of the SDA. We at SanDisk are honored to be a part of this effort and are committed to establishing the SD Memory Card as the global, universal storage card for the consumer/wireless/Internet era."