Sonic and MusicNet Partner to Bring World-Class Download and Burn Solutions to Growing Online Music Business; MusicNet Chooses AuthorScript Music as CD/DVD Burning Engine for Digital Music Services

Business Wire, August 3, 2005

NOVATO, Calif. -- Sonic Solutions(R) (Nasdaq:SNIC), the world leader in digital media software, today announced a strategic partnership with MusicNet, the world's leading business-to-business digital music service provider, under which the two companies will cross-promote field-proven digital music solutions that leverage Sonic's industry leadership in CD/DVD burning and take advantage of MusicNet's expertise in creating customized, engaging music sites with comprehensive downloading and subscription capabilities. The partnership positions the two companies for strong expansion in the rapidly growing online music services market and builds on their joint involvement in the development of two existing world-class music sites, Yahoo! Music and AOL Music.

"The better the online music experience, the more consumers will adopt online providers as their source for digital music," said Paul Greenberg, senior vice president, business development and partner relations, for MusicNet. "That means it's crucial that all the pieces work together as a single solution. With Sonic's AuthorScript(R) Music, we know we're offering our partners the leading CD/DVD burning technology, which meets the same high standards for reliability, performance, and ease-of-use that we build into our own suite of digital music services."

Under the agreement, MusicNet will promote Sonic's AuthorScript Music as the recommended burn engine for recording downloaded or streaming music directly to CD or DVD with state-of-the-art support for digital rights management (DRM), creating a best-in-class experience for customers of music sites developed by MusicNet for retailers, Internet service providers (ISPs), and other partners. By collaborating to offer a complete, top-tier solution for online music, Sonic and MusicNet will make it faster and easier for online music sellers to set up their digital music stores, adding to the sector's momentum and creating new opportunities for the growth of legitimate digital music services, whose market is forecasted to expand from $212 million in 2004 to $2.085 billion in 2009 (Parks Associates, Digital Music: Analysis and Forecasts, 2005).

"MusicNet is a natural partner for us in the online music space," says Jim Taylor, general manager of Sonic's Advanced Technology Group. "MusicNet has proven its strength in building unsurpassed music services for the world's largest, most demanding content distribution partners such as AOL and Yahoo!. Those customers have also chosen Sonic to help ensure the best possible user experience in their services, providing compatibility, speed, rich features, and virtually error-free results. Since Sonic and MusicNet have already integrated our technologies, we are ideally positioned to work together in this exploding market."

About Sonic AuthorScript

Sonic AuthorScript is the world's leading engine for the creation and burning of DVDs and CDs on PCs and CE devices. Available as a software development kit (SDK) with extensive APIs, AuthorScript makes it easy for application developers to add a broad range of CD and DVD technologies into their applications and to support the widest array of CD and DVD burners. A flexible solution, AuthorScript contains modules for converting video and audio data into DVD- and VCD-compliant streams, formatting and burning DVD-Video and VCD projects, data recording on CDs and DVDs, music CD ripping and burning, DVR recording and timeshifting, DVD-Video and VCD playback, and more. AuthorScript also includes comprehensive support for recording and editing in the DVD-VR and DVD RW ( VR) formats.

AuthorScript has been licensed by industry-leading companies including Adobe, AOL, Avid, Broadcom, IBM, Microsoft, Scientific-Atlanta, Sony and Yahoo!. It is the underlying engine in Sonic's DVD applications including MyDVD(R), DVDit(R), and RecordNow(TM), which are bundled by major OEMs such as Adaptec, Compaq, Fujitsu, Hewlett-Packard, Hitachi, IBM, Iomega, Lite-On, NEC, Panasonic, Pioneer, Sony, Toshiba, ViewSonic, and others.

AuthorScript Music allows online music services and audio application developers to quickly add CD and DVD burning capabilities, DRM support, and other advanced audio-centric features to their programs.

About Sonic Solutions

Sonic Solutions (Nasdaq:SNIC)(http://www.sonic.com) is the leader in digital media software, providing a broad range of interoperable, platform-independent software tools and applications for creative professionals, business and home users, and technology partners. Sonic's products range from advanced DVD authoring systems and interactive content delivery technologies used to produce the majority of Hollywood DVD film releases, to the award-winning Roxio(R) and Sonic-branded CD and DVD creation, playback and backup solutions that have become the premier choice for consumers, prosumers and business users worldwide.

Sonic products are globally available from major retailers, online at Sonic.com and Roxio.com, and are bundled with PCs, after-market drives and consumer electronic devices. Sonic's digital media creation engine is the de facto standard and has been licensed by major software and hardware manufacturers, including Adobe, Microsoft, Scientific-Atlanta, Sony, and many others. Sonic Solutions is headquartered in Marin County, California.