Sonic Solutions (NASDAQ: SNIC) announced today that it has reached an agreement with Daikin Industries, Ltd., of Japan under which Sonic will combine Daikin’s DVD authoring business with Sonic’s professional DVD operations. Under the terms of the agreement, Daikin will maintain an equity interest in Sonic Solutions signifying the strategic importance of the union. Sonic will acquire the Daikin products, including all intellectual property rights, and carry on development, marketing and sales activities on a worldwide basis. Further, Daikin will continue to be the exclusive distributor and service provider of the Daikin-originated authoring products in Japan.

As part of the combination, key members of Daikin U.S. Comtec Laboratories will join Sonic Solutions.
Dr. Panos Nasiopoulos, most recently President of Daikin U.S. Comtec Labs, will join Sonic as an Executive Vice President reporting to Bob Doris, Sonic’s President. Dr. Nasiopoulos is a pioneer in DVD and digital media and is recognized as a leading authority on digital video compression and multimedia technology. In addition to his role at Daikin, Dr. Nasiopoulos is currently Executive Director of the Master of Software Systems Program at the University of British Columbia, where he is also an Adjunct Professor in the department of Electrical and Computer Engineering.

Jim Taylor, who has been Chief Technology Officer at Daikin’s U.S. Comtec Labs, will also join Sonic as Chief of DVD Technology, also reporting to Bob Doris, Sonic’s President. Mr. Taylor is a very well known figure in the DVD community and was named by DVD Report as one of the world’s 21 most influential DVD executives. His book, DVD Demystified, now in its second edition, has become required reading for all DVD professionals. Before joining Daikin last year, Mr. Taylor held a number of positions in the DVD and multimedia industries. Most recently, he was the DVD Evangelist for Microsoft Corporation where he steered Microsoft’s strategy for incorporating support for DVD into the Windows(TM) operating system.