Technology Rivaling Toshiba’s Gains Backing

Sony Corp., Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. and seven other electronics makers said they will promote a rival standard to Toshiba Corp. for high-capacity optical discs.

Sony, Matsushita, Hitachi Ltd., LG Electronics Japan Inc., Pioneer Corp., Royal Philips Electronics, Samsung Electronics Co., Sharp Corp. and Thomson Multimedia proposed a 27-gigabyte standard, almost six times the capacity of current digital videodiscs and capable of recording more than two hours of high-definition video.