Synchronicity Mastering Services

This is Fred Ball for Zions Bank, speaking on business.

I recently visited with Mike Baker and Tom Whitworth from Synchronicity Mastering Services. They started a very unique business in Salt Lake in 1999 to facilitate the manufacturing of compact discs and DVDs for small- to medium-sized replication companies.

Mike tells me Synchronicity is an independent CD and DVD mastering facility that manufactures high quality stampers to optical disc replicators. I'll explain this in simpler terms. Optical disc stampers are similar to a plate that is mounted on a printing press. The printing plate carries the impressions printed on paper. Similarly, the optical disc stamper embeds digital information in the plastic discs that are required for CD and DVD playback. Unlike the printing press, optical discs can store more information. To give you a frame of reference, if the string of information created by Synchronicity for a DVD could be unraveled and placed end to end, it would cover the distance from New York City to Los Angeles. Now that's something!

Mike used to be the vice president of CD-ROM services for Modus Media, a company that used Provo-based Nimbus CD International as its mastering vendor. In 1993, he met Tom, a long-standing figure in the optical disc industry dating back to the original laser disc. Technicolor bought Nimbus and moved its operation to California, leaving behind a pool of talented mastering employees. So, Mike and Tom started Synchronicity.

Synchronicity uses million-dollar laser equipment to produce optimal quality for its customers that range from Microsoft and MGM to smaller replicators geographically dispersed throughout North and South America. Today, Synchronicity has three laser beam recorders, 18 electroplating cells, and finishing and testing equipment that manufactures up to 170 CD masters or 78 DVD masters per day.

For Zions Bank, I'm Fred Ball. I'm speaking on business.