Are Arri Buying Dalsa's Digital Cinema Business?
A letter of intent between the Canadian company Dalsa and the German company Arnold & Richter Cine Technik GmbH or Arri includes the possibility that Arri will invest in the Digital Cinema side of Dalsa's business. The announcement states that:
"Under the terms of the LOI, ARRI would acquire certain existing assets of the DALSA Digital Cinema division. Concurrently, DALSA and ARRI would enter into a technology partnership agreement whereby DALSA will develop for ARRI custom high performance CCD image sensors and related products. Furthermore, DALSA would supply the developed products to ARRI for digital cinematography applications through DALSA’s core businesses."
Patrick Myles from Dalsa explained further by saying: "We haven't reached a definitive agreement just yet, but the general idea is that ARRI would buy some of our Origin and Evolution related assets plus we would develop and supply sensors for them. The IP would stay with us but they would license it for cinema use."
Dalsa's possible exit from the digital cinematography world wouldn't surprise some observers because sales and use has always been slow, even though eight Dalsa cameras were used for the recent Bond movie Quantum of Solace. But the news would frustrate others as their cameras were always seen to be as good as anything Sony could produce. Arri's D21 has recently been updated from the D20 and also recently gone on sale, available at more than £140,000. It has always only been available through rental.
Whether Dalsa's Origin and their new Evolution cameras are to be re-badged as Arri cameras is unclear but on the face of it the mix could be a very good one for both parties.
"Under the terms of the LOI, ARRI would acquire certain existing assets of the DALSA Digital Cinema division. Concurrently, DALSA and ARRI would enter into a technology partnership agreement whereby DALSA will develop for ARRI custom high performance CCD image sensors and related products. Furthermore, DALSA would supply the developed products to ARRI for digital cinematography applications through DALSA’s core businesses."
Patrick Myles from Dalsa explained further by saying: "We haven't reached a definitive agreement just yet, but the general idea is that ARRI would buy some of our Origin and Evolution related assets plus we would develop and supply sensors for them. The IP would stay with us but they would license it for cinema use."
Dalsa's possible exit from the digital cinematography world wouldn't surprise some observers because sales and use has always been slow, even though eight Dalsa cameras were used for the recent Bond movie Quantum of Solace. But the news would frustrate others as their cameras were always seen to be as good as anything Sony could produce. Arri's D21 has recently been updated from the D20 and also recently gone on sale, available at more than £140,000. It has always only been available through rental.
Whether Dalsa's Origin and their new Evolution cameras are to be re-badged as Arri cameras is unclear but on the face of it the mix could be a very good one for both parties.
posted by Julian Mitchell at 6:35 PM
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