A government-backed trade group in Taiwan is set to launch the world’s third High-Definition DVD (HD-DVD) format next month, said a group organizer. The blue-light HD-DVD by the Advanced Optical Storage Research Consortium, if recognized by international standards body DVD Forum, will help Taiwan lessen dependence on foreign disc technology, said Derray Huang, deputy general director of the Opto-electronics and Systems Laboratories (OES) at the Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI).

The consortium of disc manufacturers is technically backed by ITRI. It earlier announced plans to develop Enhanced Video Disc (EVD) jointly with China to skirt high royalties fees charged by DVD technology owners, Huang said.

This time, the blue-light HD-DVD will scale up disc capacity to 15-17GB from the current industry standard of 4.7GB and its optical drive will boast a capacity of 18-27GB.

Huang said initially the format will be applied to home HD-DVD players and HD-DVD ROMs for computers.

The two other current formats for HD-DVD were introduced by Toshiba and NEC in August, and nine optical storage companies from Japan, South Korea and Europe in September.

Huang said the consortium has filed patent protection for the new HD-DVD format in Taiwan, the US, Japan, Europe and China.

The consortium expects to create yet another HD-DVD standard specifically for the China market in the future.