Maidenhead, United Kingdom – 2/21/2007 - Macrovision® Corporation (Nasdaq: MVSN) today announced that HIT Entertainment Limited, the world's leading independent children's producer and rights owner, has integrated Macrovision's DVD protection into its UK video portfolio. HIT Entertainment has licensed RipGuard DVD™, which combined with Macrovision Analogue Content Protection (ACP) technology, offers protection from both digital and analogue copyright theft.
DeCSS ripping breaks the CSS encryption found on DVDs and places these unprotected files onto a PC, where they can be burned onto inexpensive recordable DVDs or shared over P2P networks. Globally, over 6 million households use DeCSS rippers – a figure that suggests the practice is approaching a critical mass. According to the British Video Association (BVA), £714 million was the total retail value of cannibalised sales from digital and physical copyright theft across the audiovisual sector in the UK throughout 2005.
"With the threat of both digital and analogue piracy becoming more apparent with children's DVDs, it is essential that our new programs are comprehensively protected," said David King, Vice President of Entertainment, HIT Entertainment. "The integration of Macrovision's technology with our DVD portfolio helps to preserve the quality standards our customers expect and deters piracy, which is such a destructive force in the entertainment industry and society alike."
According to the latest results of research conducted by the BVA, DVD ripping and burning for private use is carried out by 3% of the British mainland population. Over a 12 month period, this results in the production of 9.5 million illegally copied DVDs. This figure does not include copies bought from street traders, where it is estimated an additional 17 million units are in circulation in mainland Britain alone, netting a criminal gain of over £26 million annually.
"HIT's deal with Macrovision is a welcome move for the industry at large, as it is important for rights owners to not only secure their assets, but also to be seen making an effort to protect their assets," said Lavinia Carey, Director General of the BVA. "Such measures highlight the seriousness and importance of rights protection, and encourage public enforcement agencies to make IP crime a priority."
"DVD ripping is damaging the value of new content creation, which is reducing the value of future investment," said Jim Ryan, Senior Vice President & General Manager, EMEA, Macrovision. "ACP and RipGuard DVD hit both digital and analogue areas that DVD pirates are targeting with vengeance, which will protect the value chain for consumers and content copyright owners."
Analogue and Digital DVD Content Protection Macrovision ACP for DVD prevents or distorts copies of DVDs made over an analogue interface to DVD recorders, PCs, digital video recorders in addition to D-VHS recorders (DVRs) and VCRs. By preventing copying onto digital devices, Macrovision ACP dramatically reduces the digital sharing of this content, including sharing among PCs, DVRs and over peer-to-peer networks. Macrovision ACP is the world's leading device-to-device analogue content protection system, protecting over 4.5 billion DVDs for Hollywood and other rights owners since the format's introduction.
Macrovision's goal in designing RipGuard DVD was to give the majority of this lost revenue back to studios, quarter-over-quarter. RipGuard DVD does this by blocking the majority of the real-world DeCSS ripper market and, consequently, does return a large portion of this lost revenue to studios. Macrovision's planned evolution and Unique Digital Framework design ensures that RipGuard DVD will continue to address this majority ripper market share over time.
RipGuard DVD is a unilateral content protection system that is applied to DVD discs - it does not require any additional software or hardware to be incorporated into PCs, DVD players or DVD recorders. A technological solution that effectively protects a copyright owner's rights, RipGuard DVD is complemented by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which makes it illegal to attempt circumvention of such technological measures.
About HIT Entertainment HIT Entertainment, owned by private equity investment group Apax Partners since June 2005, is one of the world's leading independent children's entertainment producers and rights-owners. HIT's portfolio includes internationally renowned children's properties, such as Bob the Builder™, Barney™, Thomas & Friends, Pingu™, Rubbadubbers™ and Angelina Ballerina™. HIT acts as a representative for The Wiggles® in the UK, US and Canada and as worldwide representative for The Jim Henson Company's library of classic family brands, including Fraggle Rock™. HIT also owns the Guinness World Records™ publishing and television property and Fireman Sam™, a joint venture with S4C. Launched in 1989, HIT's lines of business span television and video production (including studios in the US and the UK), publishing, consumer products licensing and live events. With a catalogue of more than 1,000 hours of young children's programming, HIT sells its shows to more than 240 countries worldwide, in more than 40 different languages and has operations in the UK, US, Canada, Hong Kong and Japan. In 2005, the Company joined Comcast Corporation, PBS and Sesame Workshop to launch PBS KIDS SproutSM, a 24-hour digital cable channel and VOD service for preschoolers. For more information, visit
www.hitentertainment.com.
About Macrovision Solutions Corporation
Macrovision Solutions Corporation is focused on providing a uniquely simple digital home entertainment experience by delivering solutions to businesses to protect, enhance and distribute digital goods to consumers across multiple channels. Macrovision's technologies are deployed by companies in the entertainment, consumer electronics, cable and satellite, and online distribution markets to solve industry-specific challenges and bring greater value and a more robust user experience to their customers. The result of deploying Macrovision's solutions is a simple end user experience for discovering, managing and enjoying digital content. Today, Macrovision provides connected middleware, media recognition, interactive programming guides, copy protection and rich media, data and metadata on music, games, movies and television programming. The company also operates an entertainment portal which can be found at http://www.allmusic.com/. Macrovision holds over 4,100 issued or pending patents and patent applications worldwide.
Macrovision is headquartered in Santa Clara, California, with numerous offices across the United States and around the world including Japan, Hong Kong, Luxembourg, and the United Kingdom. More information about Macrovision can be found at http://www.macrovision.com/.
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Forward Looking Statements
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