Nine Chinese manufacturers displayed EVD (enhanced versatile disc) drives at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) last week in Las Vegas.
Beijing E-World Digital Technology, the China-government-sponsored consortium that developed the EVD standard, began cooperating with US-based LSI Logic in 2003 to transfer LSI's encoding/decoding technologies based on LSI's DoMiNo architecture.
According to LSI's prediction, China's demand will exceed one million EVD drives, and might reach four million, in 2004. JiangSu Shinco Electronic Group sold over 100 units at 1,998 yuan (about US$240) in a trial promotion last week. SVA, Skyworth and others have also begun launching EVD drives under their own brands in major cities including Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. Most of the companies plan to launch products around Chinese New Year on January 22, with prices around 1,550 yuan (about US$186).
More than 400 Chinese-language movies are available in EVD format. In addition to the domestic market, Chinese companies plan to export EVD drives to other Asian countries such as Singapore
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