I wanted to take a quick minute to say thank-you for all of your comments and questions to date - keep them coming!  I’ve taken a look at all of the questions posted to the forum and instead of waiting until our scheduled Q&A in early May, I want to take this opportunity to answer a couple of questions that are particularly time sensitive.

How is Avid faring in this tough economy?  Will we see more contraction/consolidation?  Do you see the product line staying the same for the foreseeable future?

There is no question that this tough economy brings challenges for many of us, both as individuals and as businesses.  In the last year, I think many of us have had to take a fresh look at not only the way we manage our businesses but how we conduct our lives and plan for the future.  At Avid we were very fortunate that we had already started our business transformation before the downward shift in the global economy.   In the third quarter of last year we implemented a number of more efficient processes and made some structural changes, including a reduction in force and the divestiture of business lines that were no longer a fit within our core video and audio strategies.  This and our strong balance sheet are helping us to manage our business more effectively and address the economic challenges ahead of us.  We are keeping a close watch and will continue to evaluate and implement programs to help us achieve greater efficiency allowing us to continue to invest in our commitment to customer service and the Avid solutions we deliver to our customers.

As I mentioned above, the changes in the economy have forced many of us to alter the way we do business and go about our lives.  Constantly changing consumer behavior patterns, emergence of new technology players with more efficient and innovative technologies and the need for strong ROI on any major undertaking has created an environment that is not only rich with challenges but also opportunities.  We are working closely with our customers to help find new ways to address their near-term challenges.  At the same time, we are also working to understand the long-term implications and the opportunities that come with these changes.  As we emerge from this economic period, there will likely be permanent changes in the way media is viewed or listened to, and we want to ensure that we can assist you in fulfilling these needs.   I don’t expect you’ll see radical changes to our product lines in the near-term, but we are keeping an eye on a host of emerging opportunities.

I'm interested in your thoughts.

Thanks Adam... this comment ain't gonna be productive, I know...but it is a downright shame that Avid sold Softimage to Autodesk.

Hey Kirk,

As I mentioned way back at the 'new thinking' event at Universal Studios, one thing Avid could focus on in the short term is a cheap software-only shared project environment. Perhaps only 2 clients, but 3 would be better yet. Final Cut Pro doesn't really have a shared project worflow that makes any sense. And with a bunch of low-budget features deciding which system to use, the ability for an editor and one (or perhaps two) assistans to share a project over an ethernet cable would be fantastic and hard for Apple to compete with.

Chris

conleec:

...the ability for an editor and one (or perhaps two) assistans to share a project over an ethernet cable would be fantastic...

Chris and Kirk, FYI:

We are currently (due to fibre network problems with Unity) using the Interplay transfer engine and transfer manager to use our ethernet network as a conduit through the "send to workgroup" function to transmit both clips and consolidated sequences from one single platform to another single platform. Not a true fully functional "shared" environment, but the next best thing. Perhaps this idea can be modified into a new, low cost product.

well, to be honest, me and a lot of my friends are wondering about avids european pricing policy. i dont mean that 300-euro-is-not-300-dollar-thing concerning upgrades. but i would have bought a mojo dx for 4500 bucks last year if it would've been possible. i will not buy it for 6500 euros. what can we do? is there something coming up like a simple hd-monitoring-solution? that's what independent filmmakers need. or a fair deal for a mojo dx... :)

Make MC more attractive/friendly to prosumer users.

Win the battle forever.

Many of us feel that Avid had (Has) that cost effective NLE app -Liquid- about as stable as an application can be today, relatively hardware agnostic, has performed well with AMD and Intel boxes, ATI and NVidia graphics.

And most importantly has an experienced group of code writers and both paid and unpaid longtime experts.

Many feel that the replacement product will lose the professional workflow and capabilities that make the product what it is.

I probably fall in to the Avid Evangelist category.  I've cut movies with budgets ranging from 3 million to 60 million dollars.  I've cut on all the major (and some minor) systems and for my particular domain (features) there is no better NLE.  The new product line, especially the Nitris DX MC is a remarkably good system.  You want to know how Avid is doing?  Well, I can't talk about things like sales or big installations or anything like that.  I only know that when dealing with movies, especially VFX heavy movies, that the new Avids have no peer.  Are there things needing improving?  Could the Avid deal more seamlessly with all the dozens of formats out there?  Of course.  And I suspect you will continue to strengthen the platform as you go.

But it seems like the past year has seen Avid turn a most welcome corner.  And I urge you to do all you can to get the word out to young editors that when it comes to storytelling, Avid is still number one.  Others may disagree with me.  And there are a million angles from which to view your invitation for feedback.  Everyone has their own particular needs and wants.  As for me, I want an NLE that is fast, responsive and gets out of my way so that I only need to see the story.  Avid continues to do that for me.

Thanks,

David Dodson

I think looking ahead, Avid needs to see how a high speed internet can effect how we make media with Avid software.

Even a web browser based Avid editor along the lines of what 'Forbidden Technologies' have.

And to echo David's thoughts, Avid needs to place a TOP PRIORITY on making inroads into the educational community. This is where Avid's future customers are going to come from and FCP has far too dominant a presence there. I also believe that once fully exposed to the power and flexibility of it's editing engine, students would quickly gravitate away from FCP and completely embrace Avid. Visibility, visibility, visibility. And it MUST happen in the schools. The educational community, right down to the middle school level, is the foundation Avid needs to build on for the future. Offering a great educational price alone is not enough. You must actively and aggressively market the product.

"... Offering a great educational price alone is not enough. You must actively and aggressively market the product ..."

Take most of the financial resources that would normally go into general advertising, and use it to fund "nearly-free" products for students.  Even if you gave away thousands of copies today, you'd make up for it in the end.  FCP has made inroads that Avid may never catch up from.  FCP is also easily pirated, and that means everybody has a copy.  Once they figure FCP out and know how to use it, they'll continue to use it in their prodfessional life.  (Maybe even a "paid for" version)  How do you compete with that? 

As mentioned above, students and entry-level editors are your future customers.

Clearly, cost of entry is the major hurdle with the MC family. The cost should scale with media sharing capabilities, but the single box license needs to drop. In todays ecomomy, everyone is watching their money.

Avid should recognise their long-standing users and customers by offering fair upgrade prices. Like many other system owners, I paid to upgrade from MC 2.7 to 3.0. I have two systems on 3.1.1 now and the only upgrade to 3.5 I can see is "From 2.7 to 3.5". I have already paid to go from 2.7 - in my view a bigger jump than from 3.1 to 3.5. This has upset plenty of customers who otherwise would happily pay to go to 3.5. I'll soon have to bite the bullet and pay but it lesaves a nasty taste in the mouth.

Randall L Rike:

As mentioned above, students and entry-level editors are your future customers.

249 is a pretty good price for MC for a student. FCP is 699.

The bigger question is  one of hardware. A student can view his HD FCP on an external monitor with a Blackmagic Intensity Pro for 229. street. What is street on an SD Mojo? 1,500.

That is the bigger issue. 

TCurren:

The bigger question is  one of hardware. A student can view his HD FCP on an external monitor with a Blackmagic Intensity Pro for 229. street. What is street on an SD Mojo? 1,500. That is the bigger issue. 

And this is one of many reasons why I have said that Avid must aggressively market the product to the educational community. Avid reps need to meet one on one with educational administrators who approve and authorize funding levels to work out specially priced hardware bundles as well as specially priced software. It can't be done effectively with advertising or phone calls - it requires the face to face human touch.