Barrington Selects Avid For End-to-End Digital Broadcast Solutions; Mi

    Business Editors/High-Tech Editors

    TEWKSBURY, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jan. 27, 2005--Avid Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ: AVID) today announced that Barrington Broadcasting Company - a leading owner and operator of four mid-market television stations nationwide - has purchased and installed Avid(R) end-to-end digital broadcast production solutions for two of its stations. The sale exemplifies the scalability of Avid end-to-end digital production solutions, enabling small and mid-sized broadcasters to eliminate the use of tape and transition to all-digital news production methods.
    "Broadcast news continues to mature and advance technologically, prompting increased competition among stations to provide the highest quality programming to viewers who demand the very best," said Keith Bland, senior vice president for planning and development of Barrington. "To remain competitive, we sought to modernize our newsroom production systems from tape-based production pipelines to end-to-end digital workflows on a budget that reflects the markets we serve. We considered other vendor solutions available on the market and found that Avid provides all the networking, productivity, and quality advantages of the broadcast production systems owned by mass-market stations, at a price that smaller market station groups like Barrington can afford."
    For its inaugural Avid deployment, Barrington stations WHOI in Peoria, IL and WEYI in Cleo, MI successfully implemented Avid Airspeed(TM) servers for ingest and playout and Avid NewsCutter(R) XP systems for editing. The stations also installed Avid Unity(TM) LANshare systems with MediaManager to manage simultaneous ingest, edit, and output functions within collaborative news workgroups. Combined, these solutions provide a powerful networking environment that has dramatically improved production efficiencies for the stations.
    "One of the challenges in addressing the transition to all-digital production is that no two broadcasters or station groups are alike. Each has a unique market size, number of operations, geographic reach, and complexity to their existing technology infrastructures," said David Schleifer, vice president of Avid Broadcast and Workgroups. "What differentiates Avid from the competition is that we evaluate all of the market and operational dynamics for each broadcast implementation on a case-by-case basis. This allows us to truly improve production efficiencies for broadcasters of all sizes - including mid-market station groups like Barrington to the broadcasters who serve the largest markets in the world. Barrington's investment in our solutions validates Avid's flexibility and affordability for an end-to-end production pipeline."
    With the sale of end-to-end digital broadcast production solutions to Barrington, Avid continues to grow its broadcast customer base globally. Other customers that have chosen Avid's broadcast solutions for converting to digital production include major networks such as Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC)/Radio Canada, Reuters in London, and ETTV in Asia; large station groups such as Meredith Corporation and Gannett; and small- and mid-market television station groups, such as the News-Press and Gazette Broadcasting Company, Quincy Newspapers, Inc., and WEYI in Grand Rapids, MI.

    About Barrington Broadcasting Company, LLC

    Barrington Broadcasting was formed in 2003 to acquire and operate television stations in mid-sized markets across the country. Since 2004, Barrington has announced the purchase of three other network-affiliated stations and one construction permit. The Barrington station portfolio includes an NBC in the Flint-Saginaw, Michigan market, an ABC in the Peoria-Bloomington, Illinois market and a CBS in the Quincy, Illinois and Hannibal, Missouri television market in addition to a start-up WB in the Flint-Saginaw, Michigan market.

    About Avid Technology, Inc.

    Avid Technology, Inc. is the world leader in digital nonlinear media creation, management and distribution solutions, enabling film, video, audio, animation, games, and broadcast professionals to work more efficiently, productively, and creatively. For more information about the company's Oscar(R), Grammy(R), and Emmy(R) award-winning products and services, please visit: www.avid.com.

    (C)2005 Avid Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Product features, specifications, system requirements, and availability are subject to change without notice. Avid, Digidesign, Film Composer, NewsCutter, Pro Tools, Avid Unity, and AirSpeed are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Avid Technology, Inc. in the United States and/or other countries. Avid received an Oscar statuette representing the 1998 Scientific and Technical Award for the concept, design, and engineering of the Avid Film Composer(R) system for motion picture editing. Digidesign, Avid's audio division, received an Oscar statuette representing the 2003 Scientific and Technical Award for the design, development and implementation of its Pro Tools(R) digital audio workstation. Oscar is a trademark and service mark of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Emmy is a registered trademark of ATAS/NATAS. Grammy is a trademark of the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, Inc. All other trademarks contained herein are the property of their respective owners.

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CONTACT: Avid Technology, Inc. Press: Amy Paladino, 978-640-3051 amy_paladino@avid.com or Investors: Dean Ridlon, 978-640-5309 dean_ridlon@avid.com

KEYWORD: MASSACHUSETTS INDUSTRY KEYWORD: HARDWARE COMPUTERS/ELECTRONICS TELEVISION/RADIO CABLE SOURCE: Avid Technology, Inc.

Copyright Business Wire 2005