Sony and Panasonic have announced a ‘next-generation’ optical disc format called Archival Disc, and says it will be able to store up to 1TB of data.

The two companies described it as a “new standard for professional-use, next-generation optical discs, with the objective of expanding the market for long-term digital data storage”. The earliest versions of the Archival Disc will have a capacity of 300GB and is planned for launch in summer 2015. According to Sony, the two firms will “leverage their respective technologies to further expand the recording capacity per disc to 500 GB and 1 TB.”

“Optical discs have excellent properties to protect themselves against the environment, such as dust-resistance and water-resistance, and can also withstand changes in temperature and humidity when stored,” Sony said, in a press release. “They also allow inter-generational compatibility between different formats, ensuring that data can continue to be read even as formats evolve. This makes them robust media for long-term storage of content.”

“[Panasonic and Sony] plan to actively promote this next-generation high-capacity optical disc standard in the professional field in order to offer an effective solution for protecting valuable data into the future.”

(via CVG)