FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
E.DIGITAL CORPORATION REPORTS ON ANNUAL SHAREHOLDERS MEETING
Company Demonstrates First Portable e.Digital/EPAC Internet Music Player,
Announces Schedule for November Trade Shows, Press Tour
(SAN DIEGO, CA, November 4, 1999) - e.Digital Corporation (OTC: 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:
o 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.
o 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.
o Completion of the e.Digital/EPAC portable Internet Music Player featuring
e.Digital's MicroOS(TM).
o Expansion of e.Digital's engineering talent and the formation of its
Internet Audio Group.
o 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."
Mr. 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 OEM's."
Mr. 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."
Mr. 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 PC's 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.
Mr. 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 1-800-210-5592.
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.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION PLEASE CONTACT:
e.Digital Corporation
Robert Putnam or Wendy Ravenel
(858) 679-1504
robert@edig.com or wendy@edig.com
The MWW Group
Robert Ferris, Public Relations
(212) 704-9727
rferris@mww.com
_____________________________________________________
Wendy Ravenel
Investor Relations/Public Relations
e.Digital Corporation
13114 Evening Creek Drive South
San Diego, CA 92128
(858)679-1504 PHONE
(858)486-3922 FAX
Note new area code (858) as of June 1999
edig.com
investor@edig.com
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