Source: New Frontier Media, Inc.
By: Company Press Release
(BOULDER, CO) — New Frontier Media, Inc. (Nasdaq: NOOF – news), a leader in the electronic distribution of adult entertainment, announced that Spark Interactive Corporation (“Spark Interactive”), a provider of interactive telecommunication and cable television services, has agreed to provide approximately 350,000 digital customers programming from four of the Company’s networks. Under the agreement, Spark Interactive will carry Pleasure, TeN, ETC and Extasy on a pay-per-view basis in cable systems in Oregon, Washington, Indiana, Vermont and Tennessee. In addition Spark Interactive plans to offer the services to more than 114,000 hotel rooms across the country.
Spark Interactive provides programming utilizing state-of-the-art technology by partnering with local power companies. The company uses existing fiber-optics to deliver a wide range of services including cable television channels, high-speed internet service, video on demand and other telecommunication services. The company has currently deployed programming to 350,000 digital households and 114,000 hotel rooms and has plans to expand its distribution to more that 600,000 digital households and 400,000 hotel rooms by the end of 2000. “Spark Interactive is leading the way by delivering entertainment services through new technology and we are pleased that they have chosen to offer our full complement of pay-per-view networks,” stated Ken Boenish, Senior Vice President Affiliate Sales for New Frontier Media. “Their partnerships with national hotel chains are especially attractive to us since a large percentage of movie purchases in hotel rooms are adult movies. They bring a significant new revenue stream to our company. We will be working closely with the marketing executives at Spark Interactive to leverage all of our combined technology and content resources in order maximize revenue by delivering our networks and interactive services to Spark Interactive’s growing customer base” added Boenish. The Company reported that buy rates for digital customers are as much as five times higher than that of traditional analog customers.
About Spark Interactive Corporation
SPARK INTERACTIVE is currently licensing a film library in excess of 12,700 feature length motion pictures, which cover all genres. SPARK INTERACTIVE has the facilities to encode audio and video formats into digital format entertainment products.
As the world’s consumers demand more product to fill new outlets for entertainment created by emerging technologies, producers everywhere are taking position to supply the needs of the exploding information/entertainment market. SPARK INTERACTIVE knows that the development and introduction of the information appliance (i.e. a VOD set-top-box) into the home will create a global demand for digital information and entertainment products. Currently the world market for entertainment products is $600 billion, and SPARK INTERACTIVE feels that with this new ease of access that this figure will rise exponentially. SPARK INTERACTIVE is poised for the arising opportunities in the digital revolution.
ABOUT NEW FRONTIER MEDIA, INC.
New Frontier Media, Inc. is a leader in the electronic distribution of adult entertainment with an unparalleled library of content. Through its television subsidiary, the Company distributes adult entertainment via pay-per-view and subscription cable/satellite video networks. Cable/DBS networks include Pleasure(TM), the most-edited standard available in the category; TeN, The Erotic Network(TM), which incorporates a partial-editing standard and Extasy(TM), the least-edited standard.
Through its Internet subsidiaries, New Frontier Media designs, creates and implements Company-owned subscription/membership-based web sites for the adult Internet consumer markets. It also operates Internet traffic sales and acquisition programs for the adult webmaster community. In addition, the Company serves as a single source for a comprehensive range of high-performance Internet products and services, including transaction processing, dedicated access, web hosting, co-location, e-commerce application development, streaming media, and bandwidth management. New Frontier Media’s network infrastructure enables the delivery of live and on-demand video events to millions of Internet users.
For more information contact Keely Hawk, VP Corporate Communications at (303) 444-0900, extension 145.
This news release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act and Section 21E of Securities & Exchange Act. The Company intends forward-looking statements to be covered by the safe harbor provisions for forward-looking statements. All statements regarding the Company’s expected financial position and operating results, its business strategy its financing plans and the outcome of any contingencies are forward-looking statements. The forward-looking statements are subject to risks, and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those set forth or implied by any forward-looking statements.