LAS VEGAS, NV. (Gracenote, Inc/ www.gracenote.com) - International Consumer Electronics Show -- Gracenote®, the global leader in digital entertainment technology, today announced that the Gracenote
Music Management System, winner of a CES Innovations Award for embedded technologies, has been shipped in over 1 million car audio devices to date.
Gracenote's technology is enabling advances in HDD car audio, providing important new functions for instantly accessing, managing and storing an entire library of music in the car. Gracenote-enabled devices are currently offered by the following car brands: Audi, General Motors, Honda, Mazda, Nissan, Toyota and Volkswagen; and are also available through Gracenote's partner, PhatNoise, in other major car OEM brands, including Acura, BMW, Ferrari, Ford, Infiniti, Lincoln, Mercury, and Porsche.
Leading car stereo and aftermarket manufacturers also offer Gracenote's technology, including Alpine, Clarion, Fujitsu Ten, Kenwood, Panasonic, PhatNoise, Pioneer, Rockford Omnifi, Sanyo and Sony.
Please visit Gracenote's CES booth #31646 for demonstrations of several leading HDD car audio devices, including a model being offered as a dealer option for Toyota cars, a Honda unit that will be available in 12 Honda brands for the Japanese market, as well as leading devices from PhatNoise and Eclipse.
"The fast-emerging HDD car audio market is exploding with many of the leading car audio brands now onboard and using Gracenote's technology. This technology is taking the experience of car audio light-years forward - offering vastly improved usability that will forever change customers' expectations of their car stereos - something that is long over due, considering the car is a prime location for listening to music," said Craig Palmer, CEO of Gracenote. "Gracenote's technology is crucial in helping consumers make sense of their collections as well as enabling them to quickly set up playlists for the road."
"We're seeing a major shift in the industry towards HDD as a result of the customer's desire to bring digital entertainment into the car," said Sharon Graves, CEO for PhatNoise. "Although this demand has resulted in some of the work-around solutions we're seeing offered with portable devices, without Gracenote's technology in the on-board entertainment system, digital music is hard to manage for use in cars. Consumers need a quick one button access to the music they love while on the road."
A number of leading auto OEMs and stereo manufacturers are offering Gracenote's technology:
Leading Car OEMs/Dealer Options:
- Honda is now offering OEM car audio/navigation devices for twelve Honda car brands in Japan, Honda will also offer Gracenote-enabled audio/navigation systems in many of selected Honda car brands worldwide over the next few years
- Toyota is offering Gracenote-enabled car stereo devices as an option in select car models in Japan. As a service to their Japanese customers, Toyota offers information about the benefits of Gracenote's technology for car audio devices at: https://toyota.jp/toyota-navi/audio/hdd.html
- Nissan offers Gracenote-enabled car audio/navigation as an option in Japan
- PhatNoise is creating a custom edition of its award-winning removable HDD car audio system for Mazda and a brand new HDD multimedia system for General Motors; Audi, Volkswagen and Kenwood will also distribute PhatNoise's devices with Gracenote technology; PhatNoise systems are also compatible with other major car OEM brands, including Acura, BMW, Ferrari, Ford, Infiniti, Lincoln, Mercury, MINI, Nissan, Porsche, Range Rover, Scion and Toyota
Leading Car Stereo Manufacturers:
- Fujitsu-Ten's Eclipse will provide the first English-language hard-drive car navigation system with a complete music jukebox
- Sony, Panasonic and Mitsubishi have also previously adopted Gracenote's digital music information services into car audio devices
- Rockford corporation's OmniFi™ for the car is a mobile version of its award-winning digital media streaming device, which relies on Wi-Fi for synching with home-based devices.
The foundation of Gracenote's Music Management System is Gracenote's industry standard music recognition database, MusicID(SM), which can identify both individual files and CDs (provided by Gracenote CDDB**). Once music files have been correctly identified, they can be automatically organized, re-tagged with accurate and complete descriptive information, transforming them into a functional digital music library. Gracenote Playlist(SM) enables one-touch creation of playlists that goes beyond artist, album and genre-based methods. Playlist control is a crucial element in car audio as it enables consumers to generate new music mixes with the touch of a button while they keep their attention on the road. Finally, Gracenote Link(SM) enables linking to relevant third party content, such as album cover art and commerce opportunities.
* Source: IMS Research, 2004
** Gracenote CDDB(SM) is now a part of Gracenote MusicID, a global music recognition database for both individual music files and CDs.
