Toshiba Corp. said Monday it has received endorsements from four major Hollywood movie studios for its next generation DVD format, in what could be a setback for the other format created by a consortium led by Sony Corp. and Matsushita Electric Industrial Co.

Viacom's Paramount Pictures, Vivendi Universal's Universal Pictures and Time Warner's Warner Bros. Studios and New Line Cinema units chose the HD-DVD format, Toshiba said in a statement.

Toshiba, NEC and other companies are developing the HD DVD players, which are expected to become available in late 2005,

A single, dual-layer HD DVD ROM disc, which has a 30-gigabyte capacity, can hold as much as eight hours of high-definition movie content.

Blu-ray

Sony, Matsushita Electric, Sharp Corp. and other companies are developing another DVD format, called Blu-ray disc.

The Blu-ray Disc Association is expected to set technical specifications for Blu-ray discs as early as next year. Blu-ray uses a blue-violet laser to read and write data.

U.S. movie distributor Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp. owned by News Corp., has already decided to adopt the Blu-ray Disc standard for next-generation DVD players.

The DVD battle is far from over, analysts said.

"Although the four major studios picked Toshiba, Toshiba and NEC are to some extent a minor presence in the industry," said Norihiro Fujito, senior investment strategist at Mitsubishi Securities in Tokyo. "Sony has the movie studio itself, and it will mount an aggressive strategy, along with Matsushita.

Toshiba plans to launch its first HD DVD products in the fourth quarter of 2005.

Shares of Toshiba ended up 1.6 percent in Tokyo ahead of the announcement. Sony's shares gained 1.9 percent, Matsushita Electric rose 2.7 percent and Sharp added 1.4 percent. The Nikkei Average gained 1.3 percent.


Source : CBS MarketWatch