TVA-CHEM Goes Live with Avid End-to-End Digital News Solutions

TEWKSBURY, Mass., Dec 17, 2003 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Avid Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ: AVID) today announced that TVA-CHEM, a station owned and operated by Le Groupe TVA (TORONTO: TVA.B), has purchased and installed Avid's industry-leading broadcast solutions for digital news production and dissemination. The station, located in Trois-Rivieres, Quebec, is the first Le Groupe TVA regional station to convert to a digital newsroom solution following TVA's decision earlier this year to use Avid products for digital news production for its entire network. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

"CHEM needed a solution that was compatible with the Avid environment chosen for TVA's network head-end operations, but could scale both in size and cost to satisfy the requirement of the smaller Trois-Rivieres," said Luc Sauvageau, VP of Technology at TVA. "The ability to satisfy the entire range of scale of our various operations was a major contributing factor in our choice to go with Avid news production solutions. The rapid and very successful deployment of the Avid digital newsroom at CHEM is helping us operate more efficiently and cost-effectively."

The system chosen by CHEM consists of the Avid Unity^™ LANShare EX for News shared storage system with TransferManager and MediaManager software, multiple Avid^® NewsCutter^® XP systems and the groundbreaking NewsCutter Adrenaline^™ FX nonlinear news editing systems, as well as Avid CountDown^™ software and Avid AirSPACE^™ video servers for play-out. CHEM will use the systems to produce its daily regional newscasts and feed news items to TVA network headquarters in Montreal.

"We're making solid progress as the leading provider of broadcast solutions to networks with multiple operations such as Le Groupe TVA, ABC Australia, and TV Azteca," said David Schleifer, director of Avid Broadcast and Workgroups. "Networks and station groups want to work with a manufacturer that can deliver solutions that offer outstanding performance and significant productivity gains as well as scalability to suit very large as well as very small station operations economically. Our rapidly growing list of customers around the world proves that we're able to do just that."

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 news professionals to work more efficiently, productively, and creatively. For more information about the company's Oscar^®, Grammy^®, and Emmy^® award-winning products and services, please visit: www.avid.com.

^© 2003 Avid Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Product features, specifications, system requirements and availability are subject to change without notice. Avid, Film Composer, Avid Unity, NewsCutter Adrenaline, CountDown and AirSPACE 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^® system for motion picture editing. 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.

SOURCE: Avid Technology, Inc.

Avid Technology, Inc.
Amy Paladino, 978-640-3051
amy_paladino@avid.com