Dow Jones Newswires
E.Digital Up 21%; Co. Adds E-Music Player Licensee
Dow Jones Newswires
By Riva Richmond
Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
NEW YORK -- E.Digital Corp. (EDIG)'s stock rose as much as 30% Wednesday after the company signed on a new customer, Remote Solution, the U.S. marketing and sales company for Korean manufacturer HanGo Electronics Co. Ltd.
"Hopefully this is the first of several to come," said an e.Digital spokeswoman.
The San Diego engineering company said in a press release it licensed its design for a hand held Internet music player for use in Remote Solution's portable jukebox product named Cleo. Remote Solution also plans to market the player to third-party original equipment manufacturers.
Financial terms were not disclosed.
Remote Solution plans to make a "pilot run" of its new device in time for Christmas, when a "limited supply" of players will be sold from its Web site, www.pjbox.com, for a retail price of about $399, a company spokeswoman said.
The player will replace Remote Solution's current portable jukebox product, sold at a rate of about 500 a month. In addition to supporting several data compression formats that ensure music has not been downloaded from the Internet in violation of record labels' copyrights, the player will weigh less and be able to store and play back more songs, the company said.
Remote Solutions aims to start "full production" of the new player in February or March, but a spokeswoman said: "We're not sure if we will be on store shelves. We are looking forward to that."
Visitors to e.Digital's popular Raging Bull message boards have long pleaded for news of additional revenue-producing customers. The notion that the San Diego company will someday mine e-music and hand-held riches has made
e.Digital's stock one of the most talked about on the Internet. A history of losses and slim revenue, however, has kept equity analysts and institutional investors away.
The e.Digital spokeswoman said she did not know how much revenue the company would generate from its contract with Remote Solutions. Earlier this month, E.Digital reported first-quarter revenue of $125,000 and a loss of 1 cent a
share.
E.Digital's over-the-counter traded stock was up 12.3%, or 47 cents, recently at $4.53 on volume of 1.7 million shares, compared with an average daily volume of about 610,000 shares. Shares traded as high as $5.13 earlier.
-Riva Richmond; Dow Jones Newswires; riva.richmond@dowjones.com |
