Dynamically loaded structures generally require a high material damping combined with low constructive weight and adequate stiffness. Advanced lightweight structures will have to meet not only these high dynamic demands but also very high acoustic (low noise) standards. Here, especially composites and sandwiches with dynamically and vibro-acoustically optimized property profiles are needed. The design of composite and sandwich structures is complicated by the layered heterogeneous composition. Particularly, complex stress-strain relations occur even for geometrically simple structures because of the coupled membrane-bending properties. Thus, classical models can not exactly describe the vibrations and the acoustic radiation of these structures. In this paper, an analytical method is presented to efficiently calculate the eigenfrequencies and eigenforms as well as the material damping of anisotropic composite plates. On this basis, optimization algorithms are applied to optimize the dynamic property profile. Using advanced experimental techniques like the laser scanning vibration interferometer (LASVI) technology and sound power measurements within an especially constructed reverberant chamber, the vibro-acoustic properties of sandwich structures have been determined. The important influence of material damping on the acoustic radiation has been analysed by sophisticated numerical simulation methods such as the Finite Element (FEM) and Boundary Element (BEM) Method.