Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Dolby acquires Doremi

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Posted by Sam D. Chavez (Member # 1841) on 02-24-2014, 10:05 AM:

Saw this on the wire just a few minutes ago. I guess this should be on industry news but it won't let me start a new topic.

Interesting development, maybe a little late in the game.

Posted by Antti Nayha (Member # 4980) on 02-24-2014, 10:13 AM:

RTT News article:

quote:
Dolby To Buy Doremi For $92.5 Mln Cash

2/24/2014 9:31 AM ET
Dolby Laboratories, Inc. (DLB: Quote) Monday announced a definitive agreement to acquire Doremi labs, a provider of digital cinema video playback solutions, for $92.5 million cash, with an additional $20 million in contingent consideration that may be earned over a period of 4 years.

Kevin Yeaman, CEO of Dolby, said, "Dolby and Doremi Labs have complementary technology expertise and solutions. Together we'll be able to advance the pace of innovation and create the kind of cinematic experiences that drive movie attendance for our exhibitor partners."

Dolby does not the expect the transaction to have a material impact on 2014 revenue and adjusted results. The acquisition is expected to close by the end of 2014.

Click here to receive FREE breaking news email alerts for Dolby Laboratories and others in your portfolio

by RTT Staff Writer

For comments and feedback: editorial@rttnews.com

Posted by Marco Giustini (Member # 4544) on 02-24-2014, 10:18 AM:

wow

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 02-24-2014, 10:48 AM:

I'm not sure how acquiring Doremi will help or even possibly hurt Dolby (such as loading them down with debt). Does Doremi have some key patents and unique technology Dolby wants? Or could this be about harmonizing server designs and making certain features more standardized?

Doremi has a really large install base and that could translate to a larger customer base for Dolby. However, if a theater has to replace an existing Doremi server what's going to stop them from buying new servers from one of Dolby's competitors?

In the broad sense this deal looks to me as little more than Dolby buying out a competitor. I don't know enough about the specifics to really understand it.

Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 02-24-2014, 11:11 AM:

It seems to me that it makes Dolby the #1 installed base of DCinema servers world wide. While there is nothing to stop one from going to a competitor if you dislike the Dolby brand but your options, at the moment, are pretty slim. In the USA...that gets you GDC and to a much lesser extent Christie, Qube, USL and, of course, Sony. However Sony and Christie are pretty tied to the projector.

I'm sure there will be lots to talk about at CinemaCon.

Posted by Sam D. Chavez (Member # 1841) on 02-24-2014, 11:22 AM:

Maybe there another shoe that has not yet dropped.

As to debt, I'm surprised to see the seemingly low sale price. Don't think this will strain Dolby's bank account.

Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 02-24-2014, 11:49 AM:

quote: Sam D. Chavez
I guess this should be on industry news but it won't let me start a new topic.

The industry news forum might as well be deleted since all the "news" gets posted into one of the regular forums anyway these days.

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 02-24-2014, 12:08 PM:

Sad that they had to buy their way into that spot. In the old days when Sam worked there they were #1 without having to resort to buying out other companies.

Mark

Posted by Sam D. Chavez (Member # 1841) on 02-24-2014, 03:44 PM:

Oh stop!

Posted by Terry Lynn-Stevens (Member # 7349) on 02-24-2014, 05:25 PM:

quote:
Sad that they had to buy their way into that spot. I

quote: Marco Giustini
wow

I am not too surprised, the Dolby of the future will be significantly different than the Dolby experienced by those in the 1970's, 80s, 90s, etc.

Eventually Dolby will transition into a "Sight and Sound" company, Dolby is already on record stating that future growth in the mobile market is critical for Dolby. It is interesting that, Dolby Digital and Dolby Digital Plus technologies are not mandated as an industry standard for mobile devices.

I have to say, it is a good move for Dolby.

Posted by Lyle Romer (Member # 1266) on 02-24-2014, 08:53 PM:

Maybe they think that access to the installed base of Doremi servers will help with getting Atmos into more locations? Otherwise, I don't really see the value in this after most of the changeover to digital cinema has already happened, i.e. there isn't much growth in the DC server market.

Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 02-25-2014, 05:42 AM:

What is the life-cycle of the DCinema server? That will be the gift that keeps on giving...providing they innovate enough they don't lose what they have.

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 02-25-2014, 12:12 PM:

Considering these servers have a lot of the same kinds of components that go into personal computer types of devices I think a theater would be doing great to get 10 years of life out of a server.

So many things in a server or other kind of computing device can fail after so many years. Companies like Dolby don't make all the individual chips, hard discs and other stuff that go into these things. They're going to be able to provide replacement parts for only so many years before the device is obsolete. The companies who make the chips and other pieces of hardware make those specific pieces for only so many years. Then they move onto entirely different product lines.

D-cinema servers fall into a fairly "mission critical" category. They have to be operational otherwise shows will be lost. So it would probably be wise to replace an aging server after such an amount of time where it's still running but starting to become a liability. If a theater intends to run servers years past their appropriate retirement age they had better have some spares with lots of working parts laying around.

We deal with this same issue when it comes to maintaining old LED-based electronic variable message centers. After about 7 or 8 years the display is pretty much done. If you or the company who made the display don't have a lot of spare parts available the unit will simply have to be replaced. Lots of people who went cheap buying no-name brand Chinese LED signs have had time bite them hard in the ass. We're able to get more life out of LED signs by going with American companies who've been around for a long time (like Daktronics and Time-O-Matic).

Posted by David Buckley (Member # 2600) on 02-25-2014, 01:45 PM:

quote: Sam D. Chavez
I'm surprised to see the seemingly low sale price.

I suspect that Doremi were more keen to be bought than anyone was to buy them. Further, I suspect the original investors need a way to get their money out of Doremi, and the choices are go public, IPO etc, or get bought. For a company of Doremi's size, the latter is more cost effective, listing isn't cheap.

Posted by Carsten Kurz (Member # 5396) on 02-25-2014, 02:10 PM:

quote: Lyle Romer
Maybe they think that access to the installed base of Doremi servers will help with getting Atmos into more locations?

ATMOS support for Doremis is already working (same as in Christies IMB). Wether that was accomplished isolated from this deal, or wether it was part of this deals preparation talks...

In order to gain market, Dolby would have been completely braindamaged to make ATMOS an exclusive option on their own servers only. Once they had a solid ATMOS API, they sure did support other manufacturers freely.

Given the nature of ATMOS, basically every server manufacturer should be keen to implement ATMOS streaming.

That said - Doremis IMBs so far have been the only option to decode Auro 3D. Now will 'Dolby's Doremis' support Auro 3D in the future?
Was this buy, among other intentions, a cheap trick to finish with Auro 3D as well?
Dolby did the same to immSound just after their ATMOS launch...

Entirely possible that Dolby's proprietary and monopolistic object based audio system vs. competition could become a problem as well when this deal will be checked by market/financial supervision before finalization. Probably few will care, but NATO will not be amused as well...

BTW - does the Dolby IMB support stacked dual IMB and dual IMB HFR configurations?

- Carsten

Posted by Marco Giustini (Member # 4544) on 02-25-2014, 02:53 PM:

Not yet, at least that was not the case with 4.6 and I can't remember on top of my head that 4.7 brought in the feature.

Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 02-26-2014, 12:17 AM:

Nope, not yet...but clearly it is in the future.

Posted by Antti Nayha (Member # 4980) on 02-26-2014, 01:05 AM:

Is there any official word from Dolby that a dual IMB configuration will be supported via a future software update?

Let's say I'm putting together a dual-projector 4K setup that will be used for
1) single-projector 4K 2D, and
2) dual-projector 2K 3D.

Can I get a Dolby DSS200 (since I prefer it to DSS220) and two Cat 745's, so that in "mode 1" it's feeding the single projector with a 4K image via Ethernet, and in "mode 2" it's feeding each projector with a 2K image via HD-SDI?

(Of course, in that scenario one of the IMB's would be unnecessary without a future software update allowing true dual IMB operation.)

Posted by Carsten Kurz (Member # 5396) on 02-26-2014, 06:05 AM:

Dolby is not only the manufacturer of this IMB, but also sells ATMOS for premium audio and Dolby 3D for premium 3D.

With the latter being so light-inefficient, they have no other choice than to support dual IMB in order to supply stacked/dual projector configurations for large screens.

- Carsten

Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 02-26-2014, 06:42 AM:

No, no official word but if you look at the ports on it...the hardware is already there.

As for Dolby 3D...the least efficient of the bunch...though in many ways the best. In the event that laser light really starts to replace xenon, then Dolby shoots to one of the, if not the most efficient since filtration will not be required in the projector anymore.

Posted by Dave Macaulay (Member # 813) on 02-26-2014, 10:12 AM:

Why are D3D filter wheels no longer required with laser lamphouses?

Posted by Carsten Kurz (Member # 5396) on 02-26-2014, 10:18 AM:

They would need to supply at least 6 distinct and well chosen different laser wavelengths, all despeckled, in order to get it going. Unfortunately, laser wavelenghts are not so easy to choose arbitrarily at the power requirements needed for projection.

Any standard LIP will NOT be able to support Dolby 3D at all, because there is no spectrum to be split between the two eyes. A Dolby wheel in a standard LIP is useless. It needs a broad spectrum light source.

- Carsten

Posted by Dave Macaulay (Member # 813) on 02-26-2014, 12:21 PM:

Well - that's a bit contradictory: D3D will be the best vs D3D will not be possible.

Any clarity?

Posted by Carsten Kurz (Member # 5396) on 02-26-2014, 04:00 PM:

Well, once they do solve the issue with the 6 distinct laser lines, it will probably be 'the best'. From what I know about laser technology, it could take a while to accomplish this.

Plus, Dolby bought infitec to apply their technology to the cinema market, but they do not develop LIP or LIP sources themselves. They would have to wait for LLE, Necsel, etc. to develop a very specialized light source for their limited market.

Polarizing laser beams in order to use it like RealD, Masterimage or Volfoni is actually easier than that, so IMAX will certainly continue to use that 3D approach with their first LIP - but then the weakest point again becomes or remains the low separation efficiency of the screen. It will be a brighter 3D on large screens, but not necessarily better. We know that polarizing 3D can not be presented much brighter than is available now because of more visible ghosting.

Dolbys light efficiency would improve considerably, and the (already good enough) separation will probably improve even further. If they succeed with suitable light sources.

- Carsten