Adidas, Discovery Channel, and salesforce.com among leading companies using Flash Video

San Francisco - August 17 , 2004 - Macromedia (Nasdaq: MACR) today announced that leading companies including adidas, the Discovery Channel, and salesforce.com are using Macromedia Flash Video as a key component of their online experiences. Since its introduction, Flash Video has changed the way video can be presented across different platforms to about a half billion web users as part of a more immersive, effective experience. Companies are drawn to Flash because the video element can be integrated seamlessly into their websites without requiring external players. The recently updated Flash Video Gallery showcases many of the high-quality interactive content developed by leading companies at http://www.macromedia.com/go/fvg.

"Flash Video is truly changing the way people think of video on the Internet," said Greg Stern , vice president of developer relations, Macromedia. "Our developers are moving beyond merely repurposing television content to challenging users' perceptions of what defines online video."

Referred to by Yahoo! as " Hands down, the best ad of the year," the video-heavy adidas ads developed with Carat Interactive brought the company's brand campaign online with an inspirational narrative featuring boxers Laila Ali and her father, Muhammad Ali. The spots featured a rich, customizable user interface, delivered with Flash Video Streaming Service powered by VitalStream, which furthered the company's reach to young consumers.

"When we were developing the adidas 'Impossible Is Nothing' campaign, we knew we needed to integrate video to make the online advertising campaign successful," said Karim Sanjabi, executive vice president, Carat Interactive. "Flash Video was the obvious choice because of its wide deployment and ability to deliver an immersive experience that resulted in five million video views and a 24 percent lift in brand awareness."

A market leader in on-demand customer relationship management, salesforce.com uses Flash Video Streaming Service powered by VitalStream to deliver a rich Internet application that educates website visitors on the company's award-winning products and services. The application answers common questions about salesforce.com's innovative technology and business model, and helps prospective customers understand the basics of the company's offerings.

" From the moment a prospective customer enters our Web site, everything we do focuses on their success with salesforce.com," said Matt Stodolnic, director of marketing services, salesforce.com. "The immersive nature of Flash Video means that prospective customers are watching more videos, staying on the site much longer, and getting much more information than they ever did with our HTML tour."

The Discovery Channel uses Flash Video to raise interest and awareness of their television shows through high-quality promos. The channel also uses the interactivity of Flash to deliver quizzes and other content as part of the video, which wouldn't be possible with other formats.

"We use Flash Video because, quite honestly, it is the only format that gives us the control we want over the user experience," said Rob Covey, creative director, Discovery iMedia. "It enables us to deliver cross-platform video within our website that doesn't require external players, and lets us deliver value-added content within the video itself."

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