Toshiba is getting into the online music business and will start selling music for download over the Internet next year.

The company is planning a web site to launch early next year to market the music. Each download will cost 350 yen, or around $3.25.

The music download market in Japan is beginning to hot up with major players getting in on the act. Toshiba is in fact something of a late entrant, Sony set up an online venture earlier this year with links to ten entertainment and recording sites.

Register Factoid: Apparently Toshiba actually has a record label (who knew?), a joint venture with EMI, which it is planning to merge with Time Warner Music Japan.

Toshiba itself acknowledges that its own signings will not be enough to attract punters to download music from its site. This is one of the major reasons behind its planned merger with Time Warner.

The deal may yet not go through. If the European Commission's anti trust regulators take exception to a deal between Time Warner and EMI they could block the move. ®

Related Stories

Smashing Pumpkins' MP3 tells label to fornicate off (http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/archive/13216.html)
MP3.com seeks to placate Universal (http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/archive/13219.html)
Online music sales to hit $5.4bn by 2005 (http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/archive/12134.html)
EMI digital music service to debut next week (http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/archive/11940.html)
Sony Net plans to proceed with ISP launch (http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/archive/12101.html)