Sonic Solutions (NASDAQ:SNIC), announced today at the International CES Convention that it plans to support HighMAT, the digital media playback technology developed by Microsoft and Matsushita (Panasonic). Sonic plans to add support for creating HighMAT discs in AuthorScript®, Sonic's DVD creation Software Developer Kit (SDK) that is the underlying technology used to create most commercial and home DVD titles.

"We are delighted that Sonic will add HighMAT support to AuthorScript, the key enabler for the most-popular DVD authoring applications," said Jonathan Usher, Director, Windows Digital Media Division at Microsoft Corp. "Sonic's products have brought the power of Hollywood-style DVD creation to consumers by hiding and automating the complexities of DVD-Video authoring. Sonic's endorsement of HighMAT is an important step in bringing its benefits to consumers."

HighMAT is intended to make digital media formats such as JPEG photos, MP3 music files, and Windows Media Audio and Video files easily playable on a wide variety of consumer electronics devices as well as PCs. Sonic plans to incorporate support for HighMAT authoring into AuthorScript, the formatting engine which is the standard used to create the vast majority of DVD titles. By integrating HighMAT with OpenDVD, a technology for making revisable DVDs and CDs, Sonic will provide the most flexibility and highest playback compatibility to its customers.

"HighMAT is an excellent complement to DVD," says Jim Taylor, Chief of DVD Technology and General Manager of Sonic's Advanced Technology Group. "HighMAT has the potential to standardize media file playback just as DVD created a new standard for movies. With the addition of HighMAT output, applications built on AuthorScript will be able to produce discs that not only play in hundreds of millions of existing DVD players, but also take advantage of the latest DVD and CD players that incorporate the HighMAT technology. We are excited that Microsoft has chosen us to help establish HighMAT."