Sony Music Australia

From March 1993 through to approximately mid-1995 SONY MUSIC AUSTRALIA was credited within a CD's matrix. This refers to the pressing plant operated by parent company Sony Music Australia Limited — an Australian record company that was active from 1991 to 1995. Prior to January 11th 1991 Sony Music Australia Limited was formerly known as CBS Records Australia Limited (when Sony Corporation of Japan acquired CBS Records worldwide in 1988).

Sony Music Australia Limited opened its own CD manufacturing plant in Huntingwood, New South Wales during March 1993 (the first commercially released CD from this plant was '[r3527142]'). Prior to the opening of the Huntingwood plant (between 1991 and 1993) Sony Music Australia was occasionally be credited as Distributed By (e.g. '[r1982435]'), or for music Licensed From (e.g. '[r6877584]').

When (DB) is present in a disc's matrix, the glass master was created for Sony Music Australia by Disctronics B. Where (DB) is part of the matrix, please enter the LCCN roles as follows:
LCCN — releases from March 1993 to approx. mid-1995
Glass Mastered At – Disctronics B
Pressed By – Sony Music Australia
Example: '7002336' (December 5th 1994 reissue of their self-titled album).

On February 23rd 1995 the record company Sony Music Australia Limited was renamed as Sony Music Entertainment (Australia) Limited, but it wasn't until mid-1995 that the SONY MUSIC AUSTRALIA name began being replaced by SMEA in disc matrices (at which point SMEA had their own glass mastering capabilities).

A late example of a Sony Music Australia pressing is the CD single '[r12745549]' (released July 17th 1995). This release is also an example of a brief window between late February and July 1995 when "Manufactured in Australia by Sony Music Entertainment (Australia) Limited" appears on the disc or printed artwork, and "SONY MUSIC AUSTRALIA" is present in the disc's matrix (releases that combine the existence of these two company names can only have been manufactured during 1995).

During the latter stages of 1994 mould SID codes were allocated to Sony Music Australia by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI):
• IFPI 650? (where the '?' represents a letter or a number).
• IFPI 651? (where the '?' represents a letter or a number).
• IFPI 652# (where the '#' represents a number).

An example of an early mould SID inclusion is '[r4049729]' (released November 7th 1994).
*Noting that Sony Australia's implementation of mould SIDs into their disc hubs was sporadic in 1994 / 1995 — which makes determining a 'repress' CD difficult during this period. Therefore, in 1994 / 1995 the presence or absence of a mould SID code alone shouldn't form the basis of a unique release submission.
**As far afield as the early 2000s Sony Australia appears to have repackaged / reissued existing stock of CDs pressed by SONY MUSIC AUSTRALIA. Example: '[r1708031]' (5CD set released November 11th 2002, within which the first CD was pressed by Sony Music Australia).