Sony has struck a partnership deal with five music download services across Europe to bring exclusive benefits to customers of its Walkman range of digital audio players.
Sony launched its new range of Walkman digital media players in August. The devices support an open platform and include Windows Media technology in direct response to customer feedback.
The pre-digital choice for personal audio players, Sony has seen computer companies like Apple and Creative eat into its traditional market with their MP3 audio players.
The strategic partners involved are the leading multi-format European audio download services, namely HMV (UK), FNAC Music (France), Musicload (Germany), Terra Pixbox (Spain) and Planet Music (the Netherlands).
These new partnerships will provide Sony customers with greater choice for downloading and managing their music collections, including three months’ free trial for unlimited music subscription, free competitions and exclusive merchandise.
“These exclusive partnerships confirm Sony’s commitment to supporting an open standard with Windows Media Technology,” said Jeffry van Ede, vice-president, Sony Audio Marketing Europe. “We are continuously striving to provide our customers with greater choice and flexibility for managing their digital music content. We are confident that these audio partnerships benefit our customers’ desire for an open standard and further enhance the versatility of our Walkman products.”
These latest Walkman ranges support the open formats of non-secure Windows Media Audio, AAC and MP3, as well as the leading secure format of WMA Digital Rights Management 10. In addition the NWZ-A810 and NWZ-S610 Series players support the AVC (H.264/AVC) Baseline and MPEG-4 video codecs.
By Niall Byrne
