Munich—Jan 15, 2007
XDC presents its open network for digital cinema and achieves 100th installation in Germany.
On the occasion of annual Munich Filmweek, XDC - the digital cinema service company - announced not only passing of the 100 mark with its digital cinema installations in Germany (about 300 digital screens in Europe), but also its new business model for an open network for Digital Cinema. This enables content providers to prepare and manage their content via the experienced XDC Content Servicing Laboratory or to use another service company.
“With immediate effect, cinema exhibitors can either choose to finance the digital cinema equipment themselves, whereby XDC offers competitive prices to buy the equipment with the possibility to sign a full service agreement, or they can benefit from attractive full packages including all the necessary equipment as well as comprehensive service (installation, training, 7/7 helpdesk, maintenance, upgrades, …).”, says Bernard Collard, General Manager of XDC. “Operational renting (with a commitment of minimum one year) is still offered at very attractive prices.”
Exhibitors can chose from several 2K DLP Cinema® projectors1 which are installed with a XDC digital cinema CineStore® server. The servers are connected to the XDC Network Operations Centre, which allows updates, remote technical assistance and maintenance as well as data processing. The cinema operator is the owner of the server security certificate and can playback interoperable copies prepared by industry-compliant third party labs. Rights holders do not pay any screen usage fee to XDC. All installed screens are treated similarly. On behalf of distribution companies, the XDC Content Servicing Laboratory can provide additional services such as key management via its Network Operations Centre.
XDC is currently fine-tuning a long-term operational leasing offer that is particularly interesting for major cinema chains. This includes the financing of the complete equipment and all the related services and guarantees. Long-term deals will run from 6 to 10 years and are a solid basis for a potential co-financial contribution from distributors as soon as the all the concerned parties come to a consensus. “This advanced business model has been developed in order to meet the requirements of the industry in the perspective of a large scale deployment of digital cinema.”, added Bernard Collard.
XDC will shortly introducenew CineStore® G3 Hybrid Server that will play back both DCI2/SMPTE3 compliant JPEG2000 and also MPEG2 formats. This server has been developed from the beginning in accordance to the latest DCI-SMPTE standards and will comply with the certification procedures developed by the Fraunhofer Institute. With those, the whole cinema industry will operate with a unique standard. XDC will start to deliver the new CineStore® G3 Hybrid Server in accordance to the DCI/SMPTE requirements and the SMPTE interoperability calendar from beginning of April 2007.
