Joint Offering to Resolve Challenges Inherent in Asset- and Campaign-Management to Accelerate Deployment of Dynamic VOD Advertising

LOS ANGELES & SAN MATEO, Calif. – TVN, the world’s largest television on-demand company, and BlackArrow, the independent provider of advanced advertising solutions for new television platforms, announced an integrated solution to address and overcome the obstacles inherent in today’s video-on-demand (VOD) advertising workflows. Specifically, this new partnership will leverage TVN’s efficient ad distribution process and BlackArrow’s dynamic VOD advertising platform to enable customized metadata for advertising assets and a seamless methodology for rapid transfer of metadata between the two systems.
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Executive Appointment to Accelerate Market Adoption of Advanced Advertising Technology for New Television Platforms; Company Also Adds New Sales VP, Keith Kryszczun

SAN MATEO, Calif. – BlackArrow, the provider of advanced advertising technology for new television platforms, announced Nick Troiano has joined BlackArrow as company president. Troiano augments the BlackArrow executive team with proven management and business expertise in the digital media, advertising and video technology industries. With Troiano’s extensive understanding of the video marketplace, he will play a key role in accelerating market adoption of BlackArrow’s advanced advertising technology. The company also announced that Keith Kryszczun is now serving as vice president, sales.
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Standards-Based AdMap Tools Define and Manage Ad Avails; Integrate New Ad Types Easily Without Changes to Media Player Code

SAN MATEO, Calif. – BlackArrow, the independent provider of multiplatform advertising systems for viewer-controlled video, today announced BlackArrow AdMaps™, a sophisticated toolset that enables content providers and distributors to easily define and manage ad avails in and around video content. The AdMap suite extends BlackArrow’s advertising system by introducing tools to manage ad-placement opportunities for programming delivered over broadband and SCTE 130-5 compliant video on demand (VOD) environments. AdMaps provide a time-saving workflow to create new advertising inventory, integrate new ad formats easily and update ad-sales models quickly – all without requiring changes to the existing infrastructure or media player code.

The new suite consists of the AdMap Builder tool to create and manage AdMaps, AdMap Server to deliver the right AdMap for the viewer and, for broadband deployments, a software development kit (SDK) to render AdMaps in common broadband players.
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ARRIS, BIAP, BlackArrow and Sigma Systems to Showcase Personalized Television Advertising for Cable and Telecom at Management World Orlando

ORLANDO, Fla. – ARRIS, BIAP, BlackArrow and Sigma Systems jointly announced that they have formed an unprecedented group of technology leaders to revolutionize television advertising. The group will demonstrate its cutting-edge Advanced Advertising solution as part of TM Forum’s Content Encounter 3, which takes place at the Management World Orlando conference.

The Content Encounter initiative at the TM Forum encourages companies to collaborate on solutions that address the creation, delivery and monetization of digital media services. The Personalized Advertising for Cable and IPTV demonstration within Content Encounter 3 will illustrate that advanced advertising is real and doable with today’s telecommunications and cable standards, and that service providers can use a common deployment architecture to deliver rich entertainment services, including content specific ad-insertion and addressable ad-insertion.
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Allows Content Providers to Efficiently Manage and Deliver Ad Campaigns for Video Syndicated through Adobe’s Innovative Desktop Player

SAN FRANCISCO (Adobe MAX 2008 Conference) – November 17, 2008 – BlackArrow, the independent provider of multiplatform ad-management systems for viewer-controlled video, today announced the addition of Adobe® Media Player to its expanding list of distribution platforms. BlackArrow provides video content publishers using Adobe Media Player with a centralized system for defining ad avails and managing targeted campaigns against their programming. BlackArrow’s seamless advertising workflow enables content providers to broaden their syndication, while optimizing revenues from ad-supported video programming.
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NEW YORK – October 30, 2008 – BlackArrow, the independent provider of multiplatform ad-management systems for viewer-controlled video, will support the Interactive Advertising Bureau’s (IAB) “Digital Video Ad Serving Template” (VAST), an XML-based solution released earlier today that is designed to standardize communication between video players and ad servers.

BlackArrow’s video advertising system helps video content providers and distributors optimize and enhance ad-supported video programming by enabling them to offer advertisers new ad types, sponsorship packages and campaigns that combine ad units in creative ways to boost brand and product awareness. By supporting VAST, BlackArrow enables its customers to increase digital video yield by utilizing ad networks to sell unsold inventory and reduce friction with buyers via the support of third-party ad tags.
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Streamlines Deployments of Dynamic, Targeted Advertising Technology for Content Providers Using the Akamai Open Video Player Platform

SAN MATEO, Calif. – BlackArrow, the independent provider of multiplatform ad-management systems for viewer-controlled video, has released a Connector (software development kit) that integrates its ad-management system with Akamai’s Media Framework, a valuable resource for the rapid development of video player applications. This integration allows broadband video providers to ad-enable video content distributed using Akamai’s Media Framework. BlackArrow is also participating in the Open Video Player initiative, a community site intended to facilitate the development and sharing of open standards and best practices for video player applications that support a wide range of advertising technologies.

By integrating Akamai’s Media Framework with BlackArrow, premium content owners and publishers can adopt turnkey video player solutions to better maximize the return from their digital video content. This reduces the complexity of developing ad-supported video players, speeds deployments and stimulates new advertising revenue opportunities.
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Latest Round to Expand Product Development and Distribution Platform Support; Bolster Sales and Marketing Efforts

SAN MATEO, Calif. – BlackArrow, the independent provider of multiplatform ad-management systems for viewer-controlled video, today announced it has secured $20 million to further product development, expand distribution platform support and increase worldwide sales and marketing efforts. Participating in the round are BlackArrow’s existing investors: Cisco Systems, Inc., Comcast Interactive Capital, Intel Capital, Mayfield Fund and Polaris Venture Partners. To date, BlackArrow has raised a total of $38 million in private financing.
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