The tie-up allows the firms to promote each other's technology in the DVD recorder machine field, which has three main competing and incompatible formats, they said.

"Our decision to offer DVD players with DVD-RAM playback capability... will simplify the customers' choice," Thomson chief executive Charles Dehelly said in a statement.

Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. Ltd., better known for its Panasonic and National brands, wanted to promote its global number one DVD-RAM format in Europe, where it lags DVD+RW, said a company spokesman.

"Since our company has been deeply involved in content protection activities, it makes sense for us to work with Thomson," said Matsushita senior managing director Fumio Ohtsubo.

The rapidly expanding DVD recorder market is set to explode, with global accumulated sales to hit 22.6 million units by March 2006, compared to 1.3 million by last March, Matsushita said.

SPACE.WIRE