REDMOND, Wash., Feb. 5, 1997 — Microsoft Corp. today announced it has licensed technology from Matrox Electronic Systems Ltd. to extend the Microsoft® ActiveMovie
™
API into the professional video market. The collaboration with Matrox comes as a result of the leadership position Matrox holds in shipping ActiveMovie-based video products for more than a year.
Matrox has pioneered broadcast-industry-specific extensions to ActiveMovie in the areas of video capture, cut-list editing, DV/DVCPRO format support, audio and video effects, graphics scroll and crawl, and chroma, luma and alpha keying. The relationship with Matrox will help Microsoft establish ActiveMovie 2.0 as a leading professional video application programming interface. ActiveMovie is a key component of Microsoft’s strategy to bring professional media authoring applications to the Windows®
operating system and Microsoft Internet Explorer. It will provide the system services for the next generation of digital media authoring tools used to create compelling audio, video and 3-D graphics content for broadcast, CD-ROM, DVD and the Internet.
“We are pleased with Matrox’s continued development support and help in defining the video-specific design enhancements to the ActiveMovie 2.0 API,”
said Brad Chase, vice president, marketing, Internet client and collaboration division at Microsoft.
“With both professional video and high-performance graphics expertise, Matrox is an important ally as we move toward video and graphics convergence in our multimedia strategy.”
“We are using ActiveMovie as the software architecture for Matrox DigiSuite, our complete line of open-architecture, broadcast-quality digital video hardware, because it provides the flexibility, extensibility, field-accurate video synchronization and high throughput media streaming services that are required in professional applications for the television broadcast, cable and post-production industries,”
said Lorne Trottier, president, Matrox.
“Although ActiveMovie 1.0 and Matrox extensions enabled us to deliver high-performance filters and filter graphs to our customers, our work with Microsoft on ActiveMovie 2.0 will bring many new innovations to benefit the entire digital video industry.”
For more than 20 years, Matrox Electronic Systems Ltd. has been the technology leader in the development of computer-based digital video hardware and software tools. A privately held company headquartered in Dorval, Quebec, Matrox employs more than 800 people dedicated to the design, development and manufacturing of strategic products in all areas of the communications world: video, graphics, imaging and networking. In the past two years alone, Matrox has been recognized with more than 185 prestigious industry awards and has equipped more than 6 million people with leading-edge technology. For additional information, contact Matrox Electronic Systems Ltd., 1055 St. Regis Blvd., Dorval, Quebec, Canada H9P 2T4, (800) 361-4903 or (514) 685-2630. Matrox product information is available on the World Wide Web at (http://www.matrox.com/video/)
Founded in 1975, Microsoft (NASDAQ
“MSFT”
)is the worldwide leader in software for personal computers. The company offers a wide range of products and services for business and personal use, each designed with the mission of making it easier and more enjoyable for people to take advantage of the full power of personal computing every day.
Microsoft, ActiveMovie and Windows are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corp. in the United States and/or other countries.
Other product and company names herein may be trademarks of their respective owners.
For Microsoft:
Julie Whitehead, MacKenzie Kesselring, (801) 359-1005, [email protected]
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