Vizrt, a leading provider of real-time, integrated broadcast graphics software, announces the signature of a heads of agreement to purchase Escenic, a world leader in content management and publishing for the Internet.
The move expands Vizrt's robust offering of high-end graphics and media asset management solutions with Escenic's array of products that power hundreds of media sites worldwide. The companies, both Norway-based, have already begun integrating their respective tools and will display the results of this integration at the upcoming NAB 2008 show in Las Vegas, (Booth # SL4805).
This integration allows journalists and editors to search and add video content to online articles, directly from Escenic's content management system interface. The integration offers online publishers the tools to establish professional video content handling.
The solution can later be expanded to IPTV, TV and multichannel production. Similarly, the Vizrt-Escenic integration proposes a viable solution for broadcasters targeting web publishing without duplicating staff.
The integration offers three unique benefits:
--A single interface for the journalist and editor to create and publish professional media content.
--The ability to reuse video content for future stories, building up a functional, scalable asset management solution.
--New revenue model opportunities. Content can be made available, for a fee, for automatic search and download.
Vizrt President and CEO, Bjarne Berg, said, "We see great synergy from a technology and market perspective with the combined strengths of Vizrt and Escenic. The merging of Vizrt's real-time, 24/7 graphics solutions and Escenic's highly regarded web publishing software creates a seamless bridge between web and broadcast workflows. Vizrt's 1,300 broadcasting customers worldwide and Escenic's 500 media customers throughout the world provide an excellent expansion opportunity for both Vizrt and Escenic."
The integration of Escenic's Content Studio software with the Viz Content Pilot template-based graphic solution provides users with the ability to generate thousands of high-quality, branded graphics. A journalist can simply fill-in a template and associate a branded graphic to a story directly through Escenic's Content Studio GUI.
Oyvind Orbaek, CEO of Escenic, said his company has recognized the need for more professional video and graphic tools for online editors: "Escenic's customers are increasingly developing their video and TV presence for online and mobile applications. Many of our newspaper customers are planning to set up TV studios to create their own TV and video content. By integrating their media asset management system, video editing, and dynamic graphics creation tool into the Escenic workflow, Escenic can continue to provide media customers with leading solutions for online editors, journalists, and television producers. They will have access to a single interface to create and publish professional media content."
From the Viz Content Pilot's interface, Escenic users can now access a complete digital video workflow. Users can easily search, edit and store small to large amounts of video. This is achieved thanks to Vizrt's extensive range of media asset management (MAM) tools -- from the company's Viz Video Hub media asset management system to the larger-scale Viz Ardome asset management solution.
Here again, a journalist can search, edit and associate a video to an article published on the web directly through Escenic's Content Studio. Repurposing content for the web, such as 3D graphics or video clips can be accomplished immediately.
