(BSNS WIRE) e.Digital Corporation Reports on Annual Shareholders Meeting
e.Digital Corporation Reports on Annual Shareholders Meeting
Business Editors/High-Tech Writers
SAN DIEGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Nov. 4, 1999--
Company Demonstrates First Portable e.Digital/EPAC Internet Music
Player, Announces Schedule for November Trade Shows, Press Tour
e.Digital Corporation (OTCBB:EDIG) held its Annual General
Meeting of Shareholders yesterday in San Diego, California.
The company demonstrated for shareholders a production-level
prototype of the first portable e.Digital/EPAC Internet music player
and announced its schedule for participation in upcoming computer and
Internet music trade shows, and a press tour in New York and
Washington, D.C. next week.
The company summarized its accomplishments over the last twelve
months:
-- The June commencement of shipments to OEM customer Lanier
Worldwide of the Cquence Mobile Digital Dictation System.
e.Digital is scheduled to ship in excess of $1 million worth of
product to Lanier this quarter.
-- The inclusion of e.Digital in the IBM VoiceTIMES Alliance, along
with inaugural members Olympus, Philips, Dictaphone, Intel and
Norcom, as well as the completion of the initial VoiceTIMES
specification.
-- Completion of the e.Digital/EPAC portable Internet Music Player
featuring e.Digital's MicroOS(TM).
-- Expansion of e.Digital's engineering talent and the formation of
its Internet Audio Group.
-- Selection of The MWW Group as e.Digital's investor and consumer
media relations counsel.
Fred Falk, president and CEO of e.Digital, stated during his
presentation: "One of the most exciting accomplishments for 1999 is
the development of our portable Internet music player reference
design. This development effort has generated tremendous interest
within the industry.
"Our player is the first to support Lucent's EPAC music
compression technology. As some of you are aware, IBM announced that
it is using only EPAC-encoded music for their Madison Project which is
currently being conducted here in San Diego. As IBM announced, most of
the major record labels are supporting this project, and thereby EPAC.
The record labels are providing real top 20 content that the
participants of the project are downloading to their computers. In
addition to supporting Lucent's EPAC, our player reference design also
supports AAC (from Dolby), QDesign's Music Playback, Microsoft's
Windows Media Player, Liquid Audio's SP3 as well as MP3. With regard
to security, we have been working with all of the popular Digital
Rights Management providers such as IBM, Liquid Audio and InterTrust.
Our engineers have made sure that our player design is flexible enough
to support any one or all of these systems according to the needs of
our OEM customers. We are also working closely with major record
labels to make sure that our player design will support their content
as soon as it becomes available.
"Our relationship with Lucent has put e.Digital in the middle of
the digital music explosion. If you have been following the birth of
the Internet music industry this year, I'm sure you are aware of all
the MP3 music players that are currently on the market. The only
widespread, downloadable content available is in MP3 format. Generally
this format is used by unknown musicians and 'garage bands' to gain
exposure. Our focus is in supporting the most desirable content which
will come from the major record labels that control 90% of the most
popular songs and artists.
"In conjunction with The MWW Group, we are pleased to announce
that next week we will be showing our completed e.Digital/EPAC
portable Internet music player to several selected members of the
press in New York and Washington, D.C. This press tour will be
conducted in conjunction with our November 10th presentation before
the Japan-U.S. Telecommunications Research Institute (JUSTRI).
"We previously announced that we received an unsolicited
invitation from JUSTRI to present our vision of portable devices that
interface with the Internet. Our audience will include global leaders
in the telecommunications and computing industries such as IBM Japan,
NEC Corporation, Time Warner, Toshiba Corporation and many more. We
are looking forward to our presentation at this conference and the
tremendous exposure it will give e.Digital.
"We are also pleased to announce that Texas Instruments will be
demonstrating our Internet music player in their COMDEX technology
suite to key industry contacts and members of the press. In addition,
we will be meeting with prospective OEM customers to demonstrate our
completed portable Internet music player. We are also excited to
announce that e.Digital is co-sponsoring with Texas Instruments,
Liquid Audio, Thomson/RCA, QDesign, SanDisk, IJAM, RioPort and Sanyo
an exclusive, invitation-only COMDEX party featuring a live
performance by the Smithereens. COMDEX is scheduled for November 15th
- 19th in Las Vegas.
"We are further pleased to announce our participation in the
Webnoize 99 Internet music trade show in Los Angeles November 15th -
17th. Both Lucent Technologies and Texas Instruments will be
demonstrating the e.Digital/EPAC Internet music player in their
technology booths at Webnoize 99. We will also take advantage of this
show to meet with several prospective OEM customers."
Falk further stated, "Please remember, the timing of the consumer
availability of our player design is dependent on two factors: 1) The
individual schedules of our prospective OEM customers, and, 2) The
availability of content from the major record labels. As you can tell
by our announcements, we expect both of these factors to soon be
known. We firmly believe that over the next 2 years, Internet music
players that have the ability to support multiple codecs will be the
product of choice by consumers. Because of the flexibility of our
design and our MicroOS, we are able to supply these types of players
to OEMs."
Falk then addressed the company's objectives for the year 2000:
"Based on Lanier's forecasts they anticipate product shipments worth
approximately $6 - $10 million to e.Digital over the first full 12
months of shipments. We anticipate that these numbers will continue to
increase over the next two years as we incorporate additional features
that will allow this product to be sold into other markets including
the legal industry.
"We are also working on other opportunities in the digital
dictation market. This continues to be a dynamic growth industry as
dictation manufacturers introduce new digital products to replace old
analog tape technology. Currently, Lanier sells about $350 million in
analog dictation sales annually. Eventually, all of this will be
converted into digital technology. We intend to be part of this
conversion. The advancements in speech-to-text technology will also
contribute to the increase in digital recording technology.
"Our Intel relationship has taken some interesting turns in new
technology and new OEM relationships. Our business is built on
relationships, and a part of our business is honoring confidentiality
of new product plans, launch dates and proprietary information. Due to
our Non-Disclosure Agreement with Intel, we are not at liberty to
discuss details of these new technologies and relationships at this
meeting. During the coming calendar year, we expect to unveil what we
have been working on over the last several months.
"e.Digital's technology and engineering services are
proliferating into several key markets including the Internet,
consumer electronics and the PC sector. As I mentioned earlier, the
player design that you will see and hear today is going to be shown at
COMDEX and Webnoize by Lucent, Texas Instruments, and QDesign. This
exposure will generate enormous interest from potential OEM customers.
In parallel, we will continue to pursue our existing OEM opportunities
and expect to be making announcements in the very near future.
"We expect the on-line digital music market will grow over the
next two years as the foundation of this industry is being built, i.e.
a de facto standard, chosen by consumers, for audio compression
technology, digital rights management systems, content, and secure
portable players. Once the foundation is in place, the market will
explode. We're part of that foundation and we will continue to expand
our presence in this new and exciting industry."
Falk concluded by stating, "We are successfully positioning
e.Digital as a leader in the portable, digital revolution
incorporating voice, music, and soon, full motion video into handheld
devices that connect to PCs and the Internet. We thank you, our
shareholders, for your continued support as we build e.Digital into a
globally recognized and successful company."
Directors Skip Matthews and Allen Cocumelli addressed the 350+
shareholders in attendance, giving their perspectives on the
importance of e.Digital's emerging leadership in connecting portable
products to the Internet.
Falk concluded the company's presentation by then unveiling and
demonstrating the e.Digital/EPAC Internet music player to the
standing-room-only audience.
An audio recording of the meeting is available toll-free for the
next seven days at 800/210-5592.
About e.Digital Corporation
e.Digital Corporation offers an engineering partnership for the
world's leading electronics companies to link portable digital devices
to PCs and the Internet. Engineering services range from the licensing
of e.Digital's patented MicroOS(TM) file management system to custom
software and hardware development, design and manufacturing services.
For more information on the Company, visit www.edig.com.
Safe Harbor statement under the Private Securities Litigation
Reform Act of 1995: This press release contains forward-looking
statements relating to future performance, technology and product
development that may impact on future results and the future viability
of the company. Actual results could be affected or differ materially
from those projected in the forward-looking statements as a result of
risk factors such as: future products and results; technological
shifts; potential technical difficulties that could delay new
products; competition; general economic conditions in the markets in
which the company operates; the ability of the company, its customers,
and suppliers to become Year 2000 compliant; pricing pressures; and
the uncertainty of market acceptance of new products by OEM's and
end-user customers.
Note to Editors: e.Digital and MicroOS are trademarks of
e.Digital Corporation. All other product, company, or service names
are the property of their respective owners.
--30--EZ/se*
CONTACT: e.Digital Corporation
Robert Putnam or Wendy Ravenel, 858/679-1504
robert@edig.com or wendy@edig.com
or
The MWW Group
Robert Ferris, 212/704-9727
rferris@mww.com
KEYWORD: CALIFORNIA NEW YORK DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA INTERNATIONAL
ASIA PACIFIC
INDUSTRY KEYWORD: COMPUTERS/ELECTRONICS INTERNET HARDWARE
SOFTWARE
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