Christie and Time Anateus launch China’s largest commercial D-Cinema deployment

posted by Michael Zoldessy on September 8, 2009 at 7:58 am

BEIJING, CHINA — Christie, the global leader in visual solutions for entertainment, business and industry, is pleased to announce that Time Antaeus (Time Antaeus) Media Group, a Chinese digital cinema industry leader, has selected Christie as its very important partner for its digital cinema deployment in China. This marks the country’s most extensive commercial effort to install 800 Christie CP2000 series DLP Cinema projectors in select cinemas by the end of 2010. These projectors will be installed together with 800 Time Antaeus Montage CDCS2000 D-Cinema Servers.

After conducting a series of extensive evaluations on the various solutions available, Time Antaeus opted for Christie’s acclaimed CP2000 DLP Cinema projectors based on their superior image quality and reliability. With their excellent brightness, contrast, true color reproduction and product integrity, the Christie CP2000 series projectors are widely popular among theater operators and have won numerous positive reviews from the industry. In addition, Christie’s proven leadership, with a commanding 70% worldwide market share that includes more than 7,500 systems worldwide – as well as an extensive understanding of the cinema industry – also motivated Time Antaeus to select Christie as a partner.

The collaboration between Christie and Time Antaeus began at the 2008 Beijing Summer Games' ceremonies with the purchase of 120 Christie CP2000-ZX models. The CP2000-ZX digital cinema projectors delivered spectacular visuals throughout the event, demonstrating their full flexibility in a non-cinema environment. After the ceremonies, these projectors and Time Antaeus' Montage CDCS2000 D-cinema servers were installed by CFG-Antaeus (CFG-Antaeus) Digital Cinema Investment Co. Ltd., a joint venture of China Film Group and Antaeus Group, in theaters across China. This marked part of the company’s digital cinema pilot. In August 2008, Christie and Time Antaeus were selected by CFG-Antaeus to provide another additional 400 units of digital cinema projectors and servers.

As part of the tailored digital cinema solution installed by CFG-Antaeus, the Montage CDCS2000 D-cinema server provided is a joint development between Time Antaeus and Doremi Cinema. It conforms to the DCI (Digital Cinema Initiatives) specifications for digital cinema servers. Capable of playing JPEG2000 digital movies with an excellent 2K resolution playback of up to 250Mbits/sec, the server promises an enhanced movie-going experience. Using AES128 encryption for keys, CDCS2000 supports watermarking through Thomas and NextGuard technologies. This FIPS140-2 Level 3-certified server is a milestone in China’s digital cinema industry, as it meets global standards and is making its mark on the global cinema scene.

The pilot test of the 120 units of Christie CP2000 series digital cinema projectors and Time Antaeus' Montage CDCS2000 D-cinema servers installed in the theaters across China proved to be a tremendous success. Since starting operation, they have experienced “zero” failure rates, offering users a high level of stability. This tailored digital cinema solution also supports devices such as JNior, eCNA as well as 3D Technologies such as Dolby 3D, MasterImage, RealD and XpanD. It also includes a Theatre Management System (TMS) to allow remote content programming and management. In addition, the server can be remotely monitored by a network operations centre.

“We selected Christie because they offer a range of proven entertainment solutions with remarkable image quality, reliability and stability,” says Mr. Zhang Baoquan, Chairman of the Board for Time Antaeus Media Group. “Most importantly, we foresee their excellent service and undisputed success in the series of massive deployments around the world. This will certainly help us contribute to the growth of the digital cinema market in China. As a leading player in the local cinema industry, we have contributed to the digital cinema infrastructure in terms of production and distribution. Now, we have completed the digital chain by embarking on the digital exhibition platform. By advocating digital cinema deployments on a massive scale, we hope to turn digital movies into mainstream popular culture that is readily available and affordable to the masses.”

“China has always been an early adopter of digital cinema technologies,” comments Jack Kline, President and COO, Christie Digital Systems USA, Inc. “As early as 2001, the country started its nationwide film-to-digital transition. In addition to the state-level developments, commercial market forces are now coming together to further spur the growth of digital cinema in the country. Time Antaeus' massive rollout is the largest single, commercial effort and places China at the forefront of the digital cinema evolution, surpassing many other countries in the world. With its market of affluent consumers, China demonstrates huge potential for the entertainment market, especially for the cinema industry. These favorable market forces will continue to propel the explosive growth of digital cinema in the country.”

“With eighty years of experience, Christie is one of the pioneers directly involved in the early developments of the cinema industry,” says Lin-Yu, vice-president, Christie, Asia Pacific. “With our extensive understanding of the cinema business and the success of massive deployments worldwide, we’re pleased to extend our experience and expertise to theater owners in China and bring the digital cinema experience to a brand new level. We’re honored that Time Antaeus chose Christie for its second phase of digital cinema deployment. The excellent synergy between Christie and Time Antaeus during the 2008 Beijing Summer Games started a memorable working relationship and most importantly, created an unforgettable visual experience witnessed by many around the world.”

About Time Antaeus
Founded in 2005, Time Antaeus Media Group is a specialist in the cinema industry with extensive capabilities which include film funding and movie distribution, R&D on digital cinema solutions, theatre funding, expansion and franchising of digital cinemas, high-end cinema management, construction and operations of Movmal.

Time Antaeus Media Group consists of nine subsidiaries —– Time Antaeus Media Technologies Co., Ltd., Time International Entertainment Co., Ltd., Time Huaxia Antaeus Cinema Development Co., Ltd., Time Antaeus Cinema Investment Co., Ltd., Century United Network Technologies Co., Ltd., Time Antaeus Movie Culture Co., Ltd., Antaeus Universal Digital Technologies Co., Ltd., Antaeus Haoying Digital Cinema System Sales Co., Ltd. and Chinafilm Antaeus Digital Cinema Investment Co., Ltd. All of them work together to drive the growth of the group in terms of channels, content and technologies.

Time Antaneus Media Technologies Co., Ltd. is an integrated technological operation under the group, combining system R&D, production, sales and technical support services. Since its establishment, it has independently developed five types of digital cinema servers, which makes it the only market leader in China that covers all three levels of the movie distribution market in the local digital cinema industry.

With the recent contract to equip Wanda Cinemas (China) with 100 Christie digital cinema projectors and following the series of deployments with Shanghai Film Group, Lianzhong and other cinema exhibitors, it is estimated that Christie DLP Cinema projectors will be found in more than 1,000 digital cinema sites across China.
For more information, visit www.christiedigital.com