Eidos Plc, the software-only video compression and decompression specialist, has spent the past four years since inception struggling to get out of the red. But green shoots have now appeared, and the company’s interim results show pre-tax profits of UKP47,834 on turnover of UKP188.196. Charles Cornwall, chairman, says the turnaround is largely down to the fact that Eidos is now a commercially-driven software developer, rather than the research and development organisation it once was. According to Cornwall, Eidos has spent the first half of the year concentrating on the technology development and is now moving towards marketing those technologies. In order to fund development costs, the company has turned to third party developers, most notably On Demand Information Plc and Visual Access Ltd. Eidos developed a series of algorithims for On Demand to transmit pre-recorded video down ISDN lines for the company’s information network, with Eidos receiving royalties for it on a subscriber basis. Eidos has also developed software to enhance Visual Access video display systems with revenues on a per unit basis. The company is also working with a further three or four third party developers, as yet to be named. According to Cornwall if you get someone to pay you, you’re far more likely to get a licensing deal. In terms of development technologies, Eidos is currently developing a software alternative to MPEG that it says will deliver playback in software at the VHS equivalent of 25 frames per second in 24-bit per pixel graphics. The companys says it’s aimed at games writers and will provide a lower cost alternative to its hardware equivalent. Eidos is also working on software coder-decoders for high quality via ISDN networks and has jumped on the Internet bandwaggon with a high quality video playback and videomail system which is currently in development. Eido’s videophone, touted to be a lower cost equivalen to the British Telecommunications Plc-IBM Corp one, now runs on any 80486 up at 320 by 240 pixel full colour under Video for Windows. Cornwall predicts an explosive growth in the networked commercial market for this product. The company says it has also improved the picture quality on its professional editing software. Currently in beta test, the latest version claims to offer spatial resolution four times greater than before and will compete aggressively with the leaders in this field by providing comparable functionality at a substantially lower price. For the future Cornwall sees the next step being to tie down a major licensing deal to gain credibility with the majors.
