Matsushita to mass produce double-layer Blu-ray discs

Plans are being put in place to mass produce double-layered Blu-ray discs by Japanese company Matsushita Electric Industrial Co Ltd. A report by Japanese business paper Nihon Keizai Shimbun states that samples of the next-generation disc will be shipped out to Hollywood studios by January 2006.

According to Nihon Keizai Shimbun, Matsushita, which already mass produces single-layer Blu-ray discs, installed a line to produce the double-layered discs in October at a site in California.

Matsushita is currently working on raising production speed for double-layered Blu-ray discs, as well as lowering costs and defects.

The double-layered disc can store 50 gigabytes of data - twice as much as single-layer Blu-ray discs and ten times the amount of current generation DVDs.

Source: Forbes

Related:

• PS3 to secure Blu-Ray’s win over HD DVD by 2010
• HD DVD superior to Blu-ray, says Toshiba
• Warner Bros. to support Blu-ray format