Maverick high-definition DVD player costs £95

The developer of a maverick high-density DVD format announced its first player today at a fraction of the price of devices using the mainstream Blu-ray and HD-DVD formats.

London-based New Media Enterprises announced its Versatile Multi-layer Disc (VMD) format at Cebit earlier this year. It uses low-cost red lasers used in existing DVD players but, as its name suggests, can pack up to 40GB on a single disc by stacking the data at different levels.

The player, launched at the Mipcom digital-content show in Cannes, will cost about $175 (£95). Availability dates were not announced.

The product seems unlikley to dent the market for Blu-ray and HD-DVD players, because deals have already been signed with major Hollywood and European companies to sell titles in these formats.

New Media Enterprises said at Cebit that it would initially target the Chinese and Bollywood markets - the latter, in particular, is very big in Britain. A spokeswoman for the company said today that other content providers had shown interest and a deal with one German company is expected to be announced shortly.

This is not be the first time that Asian content providers have gone their own way on disc formats. The Video Compact Disc (VCD) format never took off in Europe but has been big in Asia, where it is widely used for pirated movies.

Hollywood would want to see rigid digital-rights management (DRM) in place before it allowed VMD to be used to distribute movies legitimately.