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Pioneer Europe Chooses Sonic MyDVD™

Selects Award-winning DVD Authoring Solution for New DVD-R/RW Writers

Hannover, Germany (March 22, 2001) — Sonic Solutions [NASDAQ: SNIC], the world leader in DVD authoring applications, announced at CeBIT today that Pioneer Europe, the leading manufacturer of recordable DVD drives, will bundle Sonic MyDVD™ authoring software with the new Pioneer DVR-A03 DVD/R/RW drives, the company's third-generation DVD recorder. Priced at less than €1000, the Pioneer DVR-A03 breaks a significant price barrier and, when combined with MyDVD, is the first affordable DVD recording device for home users and small businesses who want to record and author their own videos in the popular DVD-Video format.

"With their strong leadership in DVD publishing software, Sonic was the natural choice as our DVD authoring partner," said Takumi Kigoshi, Product Planning Manager for Pioneer Europe's Multimedia Division. "Over the past five years, Sonic and Pioneer have worked closely together to introduce DVD recordable devices to the Hollywood and high-end professional markets. Now, with our collaboration on the A03, Pioneer and Sonic will greatly expand the possibilities for video publishing among home users and small businesses."

The Pioneer DVR-A03 offers exceptional format flexibility and finished video projects can be written to CD-R, CD-RW, DVD-R and DVD-RW media. The DVD-RW discs are based on phase-change technology and can be re-recorded over 1,000 times. Projects written by MyDVD to DVD-R and DVD-RW media can be played back on both DVD set-top players or multimedia PCs, which together have an installed base of close to 100 million units.

"We're excited to be working with Pioneer to deliver a digital video publishing solution for home users," said Rolf Hartley, Vice President of European Operations at Sonic. "For the first time, consumers can add the great features of DVD – interactivity, higher quality and fast access – to their personal videos and then record their own DVD-Video discs.

The Pioneer DVR-A03 with Sonic MyDVD is the breakthrough that makes personal video publishing possible." The Pioneer DVR-A03 will be available in late spring and, retailing at less than €1000, breaks a significant price barrier. Pioneer has already received significant commitment from OEM partners – including Compaq and Packard Bell – which are including the A03 with their high-end multimedia PC offerings.

About Sonic MyDVD
The first DVD authoring application for consumers, MyDVD makes it easy to capture "your life on DVD." With its remarkably friendly user interface and intuitive authoring, MyDVD makes it possible for home video enthusiasts to take video, music, digital photos, and scanned artwork and create their own interactive movies. Users can record their finished DVD projects on the latest generation of DVD recordable drives, making it easy to publish interactive videos on universal, low-cost media and play them on any DVD player.

About Pioneer
Pioneer Europe N.V. (PEE), Multimedia Division is part of the Pioneer Corporation (PEC) which began as an audio products manufacturer in Japan in 1938 and is now a world leader in electronics products for the home, commerce and industry. Based outside London, England, PEE's Multimedia Division has seven distribution subsidiaries located throughout Europe and is a leader in multimedia technologies, both optical disc and large screen audio-visual display and presentation. In August 1998, during the year of its 60th anniversary, Pioneer announced a new global business vision, strategy and corporate brand identity. It included aims to more than double turnover by 2005 from US$4.2 billion to nearly US$9 billion and lead the world in the two core multimedia technologies – Digital Versatile Disc (DVD) and plasma display panels (PDP) – by 2000. The two latter goals were achieved at the end of 1999. For further information and photography, please contact Pioneer Multimedia: optical@mmd.pioneer.be

About Sonic Solutions (NASDAQ: SNIC)
Based in Marin County, California, Sonic (http://www.sonic.com) is the leading manufacturer of solutions for DVD publishing. Sonic DVDit!™ (http://www.dvdit.com) is the first application for DVD authoring targeted at videographers and corporate video producers, and is bundled with major video editing, capture, encoding and media production systems. Sonic MyDVD™ (http://www.mydvd.sonic.com) is the first DVD authoring application for consumers, making it easy to capture "your life on DVD." Sonic DVD Creator®, Sonic Scenarist®, Sonic ReelDVD® and Sonic DVD Fusion® are the most widely-used systems for professional DVD publishing, and are installed worldwide at major studios, post production facilities and in corporate marketing departments. SonicStudio® HD is the leading digital workstation for preparing audio for release on CD and is the first for creating content for the new DVD-Audio format. Sonic is also a full voting member of the DVD Forum, the standards-setting body for the DVD format.