http://www.avid.com/news/press_releases/corporate_financial/mac_support.htm l
Macintosh Support Continues
Over the past week, published stories fueled by a misquote on macweek.com have been flying over email, online trade journals, and newsgroups that Avid is abandoning the Macintosh platform. We wanted to take a few moments to dispel this misconception. Please be assured that the Macintosh platform continues to be an important part of our strategy.
We built our company on the Macintosh platform and over the last year we have made large investments in developing products for this platform. This includes not only the Media Composer 7 release, which was the biggest release in Media Composer's history, but beyond that as well with the development of the PCI Extender to support Apple's new G3 hardware.
Further, at NAB, we announced and will soon ship the Media Composer XL family for the Macintosh, which supports our latest Meridien video hardware with customer-requested new capabilities like uncompressed images on the Macintosh platform. We think you will agree that these are not the signs of a company abandoning the Macintosh platform.
Likewise, we will continue to support the Macintosh platform into the future. We have an installed base of over 25,000 Mac-based editing systems and we remain committed to the owners of these systems. We are planning on further development in support of both PCI/ABVB-based Media Composer systems, Media Composer XL for Macintosh and Xpress for Macintosh systems. While it is too early to discuss details of these release plans, likely enhancements will focus in the area of usability improvements and collaboration features to ensure that the systems continue to excel as part of a seamless nonlinear production environment.
We also continue to work closely with Apple across a number of other fronts. In addition to our ongoing work with Apple on Media Composer and Avid Xpress, Avid is actively engaged in Macintosh developments on several other products including the Digidesign's Pro Tools line of digital audio solutions and Avid Cinema for iMac, currently the only USB video editing solution for Apple's popular iMac line. Again, our commitment to these customer bases and Apple remains strong.
As we invest in the Macintosh platform, it has been clear for some time that we are also making investments in Windows NT-based products through both our own internal development and through partnerships and acquisitions. Many of our customers have been asking for Windows NT solutions and segments of the market have been moving that way for some time. We will continue to invest in Windows NT development, especially in high-end finishing systems including Avid Symphony and Avid SOFTIMAGE|DS where the performance, bandwidth, networking, and scalability of Windows NT make it a more appropriate platform. Consequently, many of these high-end features will remain NT-specific.
Because there is demand for both, a key part of our overall strategy is to ensure that our products work together in a mixed platform environment -- customers can purchase both Macintosh and Windows NT-based products with confidence. For example, we have invested in Avid Unity MediaNet to support a multi-platform environment connected via a common shared storage resource; we have developed "Total Conform" to retain creative decisions across our Avid Xpress, Media Composer, and Symphony families; and we have brought media compatibility across our editorial products by now supporting our Meridien video subsystem on both Mac and Window NT-based systems. We will continue to develop interoperability and collaboration enhancements across the product lines to ensure the systems customers have today and may purchase in the future work together in a nonlinear production environment. This is a key element of both our Macintosh and Windows NT plans.
We believe the new products we announced at NAB will have a profound impact on our customers' businesses and the way film and television programs and other videos are created. Our goal is to protect your existing investment in Avid products and to offer you choices when it comes to adopting new technology. Therefore, at NAB we also rolled out a whole host of aggressive upgrade programs for those who want to get the most of their current system (through release upgrades and software-based model upgrades) or those who want to take advantage of one of the new Meridien-based systems (through extremely cost-effective trade-up programs). These programs are comparable whether you want to move to an NT-based or Mac-based system and are designed to provide you with a variety of choices and the time they need to make the decisions to optimize their businesses.
Here are some press links that clarify our position on the Macintosh platform: http://www.tvbroadcast.com http://www.macnn.com http://www.maccentral.com/news/9904/27.avid.shtml
If you have additional questions, please contact Avid Customer Relations by email at customer_relations@avid.com or by phone at 800-894-5654 or 978-275-2555.
About Avid Technology Avid Technology, Inc., which acquired Softimage Inc. in 1998, is an international, industry-leading provider of digital audio and video tools for information and entertainment applications. The company's products are used by a variety of customers worldwide including film, television and interactive content producers, TV news broadcasters, corporate communicators and consumers. For more information, visit Avid's Web site at www.avid.com or the Softimage site at www.softimage.com.
