Media Release: VICTORIAN COMPANY LEADS THE WORLD IN DIGITAL MEDIA TECHNOLOGY

FROM THE MINISTER FOR INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY

DATE: Wednesday, April 13, 2005

VICTORIAN COMPANY LEADS THE WORLD IN DIGITAL MEDIA TECHNOLOGY

Victorian digital media company ndWare has launched a world-first technology for mobile phones, with the help of Multimedia Victoria funding through Film Victoria.

The exciting new content production tool – Richmotion Live – allows users to quickly and easily produce rich media content that can be distributed to just about any colour screen mobile phone.

The Minister for Information and Communication Technology, Marsha Thomson, said the development of this unique and versatile new technology showed the Victorian Government’s commitment to fostering research and development in ICT was reaping rich rewards.

“The development of Richmotion, helped by Film Victoria’s Digital Media Fund, is an excellent example of the State Government providing seed funding for Victorian technical innovation in software development,” Ms Thomson said.

“Not only do these cutting-edge developments benefit Victoria’s digital media industry, they also raise international awareness of the burgeoning ICT industry in Victoria.”

The new stand-alone content production tool Richmotion Live includes an easy-to-use WindowsŽ based Composer tool and a proprietary compiler and playback system. Centred on powerful cross-platform micro-player architecture, this world-first technology enables content delivery to the widest range of mobile platforms.

“Victoria’s game software development industry currently relies on service contracts which are becoming increasingly difficult to obtain due to increased global competition,” Ms Thomson said.

“Richmotion will provide a means of obtaining export income primarily from licensing deals, diversifying the source of export-generated income,” she said.

The CEO of ndWare, Robert Murray, believes the global demand for Richmotion technology would provide Victoria with increased income from international sales and a new base for product driven research and development.

“The primary means for generating revenue will be through licensing fees for the Richmotion toolset. The efficiencies of internet based sales and marketing methods and the high level of connectivity of the target market will allow ndWare to sell Richmotion technology to a large number of mobile developers internationally,” Mr Murray said.

Richmotion Live offers:
ˇ Faster and easier mobile development and prototyping – The Richmotion Live Composer is the easiest way to produce presentations for mobile phones. The familiar, timeline based tool allows sophisticated animations to be built up from component parts. With the press of a button you can compile your content into a J2ME application ready for installation to your mobile phone.
ˇ Very wide market of target devices – The Richmotion Live micro-player runs on top of existing mobile platforms including J2ME and i-mode DoJa so your content is already supported by over 80% of the colour screen mobile phone market.
ˇ An ‘evolvable’ platform for content presentation – The Richmotion Live micro-player is embedded within your actual content, so there is no need to worry about different player or browser versions. As more powerful features are added to the Richmotion Live tool you will be able to begin using them immediately with your existing distribution network.

ndWare is a Victorian company founded in 1999 by Robert Murray that develops games and applications for handheld devices, providing a suite of advanced tools, techniques and engines for mobile media publishing.