Sony Music company in Hong Kong from December 1990 as the successor to CBS/SONY HONG KONG LTD..
In August 2005, the company was renamed to Sony DADC Hong Kong Limited.
Please note that in 2009 a new Sony Music company was established in Hong Kong called 'Sony Music Entertainment Hong Kong Ltd. (without parentheses).
Do not use this as a label, use it for company roles, such as phonographic copyright.
Album codes for Sony Music released for the Hong Kong market including domestic repertoire, even in albums from English-speaking countries are different from other countries. This anomaly ended in the late 1990s.
How to identify releases:
For albums released before 1998-1999, the code of the album differs between releases.
SMP - Columbia (foreign releases, except for Japanese albums which uses SMJ)
SML - Columbia (local repertoire)
E - Epic (foreign releases, except for Japanese albums which uses ECJ)
ECL - Epic (local repertoire, almost never used)
Note: Albums with two CDs uses two separate codes.
The usage of barcode such as 5 09974X XXXXXX, may have been started during that time, despite the use of different codes at that time. As late as 1998, Sony Music still uses the SML code for local albums (as Sony Music Hong Kong release smaller number of albums from Hong Kong singers), and had the barcode 4 893255 XXXXXX (the last two digits are the same as most Sony Music releases globally). Another barcode used is 4 893391 XXXXXX for Western album releases.
The code used for almost all albums since 1998-1999, are almost always separated with a dot between the album and format code, example: 502434.2. Releases from that period uses only the generic Sony Music logo.
Codes are either three or four digits, followed by the number 2 (9 is also used) for CD and 4 for cassettes. The four letter code is also used in some releases, with the extra letter as the fourth letter. These codes are different from that used when it was still known as CBS/SONY HONG KONG LTD..