# Avid Technology

Avid Technology, Inc. is a global technology company headquartered in Burlington, Massachusetts, and was founded in August 1987 by Bill Warner. It develops software, SaaS, and hardware products used in media and entertainment.
Avid products and workflow solutions are used extensively in Hollywood and the film industry; in the broadcast television and streaming media industry; and the music industry. It is known for its video editing software, audio editing software, music notation software and media management and distribution services.

## Products

Avid's software and hardware are used by companies and individuals in the media and entertainment industry.
Media Composer and Avid | Edit on Demand: Professional-grade video editing software.
MediaCentral and Avid | Stream IO: Workflow management for news and sports media.
NEXIS: Shared and nearline storage for video and audio.
Pro Tools: Software for music creation and audio production.
Venue: Hardware consoles and tools for live sound.
Sibelius: Music notation and engraving software.

## History

Avid was founded by Bill Warner, a former marketing manager from Apollo Computer.
A prototype of their first non-linear editing system, the Avid/1 Media Composer, was shown at the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) convention in April 1988. The Avid/1 was based on an Apple Macintosh II computer, with special hardware and software of Avid's design installed. The Avid/1 was "the biggest shake-up in editing since Melies played with time and sequences in the early 1900s".
By the early 1990s, Avid products began to replace such tools as the Moviola, Steenbeck, and KEM flatbed editors, allowing editors to handle their film creations with greater ease. The first feature film edited using the Avid was Let's Kill All the Lawyers in 1992, directed by Ron Senkowski. The film was edited at a 30fps NTSC rate, then used Avid MediaMatch to generate a negative cutlist from the EDL. The first feature film edited natively at 24fps with what was to become the Avid Film Composer was Emerson Park. The first studio film to be edited at 24fps was Lost in Yonkers, directed by Martha Coolidge.
By 1994 only three feature films used the new digital editing system. By 1995 dozens had switched to Avid, and it signaled the beginning of the end of cutting celluloid. In 1996 Walter Murch accepted the Academy Award for editing The English Patient (which also won best picture), which he cut on the Avid. This was the first Editing Oscar awarded to a digitally edited film (although the final print was still created with traditional negative cutting).
In 1994 Avid introduced Open Media Framework (OMF) as an open standard file format for sharing media and related metadata.
Over the years, Avid has released numerous freeware versions of Media Composer. Initially this included Avid Free DV: a free edition of Media Composer with limited functionality; Avid Xpress DV: a consumer edition of Media Composer; and then Avid Xpress Pro: a prosumer edition of Media Composer. These editions were discontinued in 2008 as the flagship Media Composer was lowered in price. Later, Avid released Media Composer | First, which included a large portion of Media Composer's functionality but its exporting workflows publishing finished videos directly to web services like YouTube.
On March 29, 1999, Avid Technology, Inc. adjusted the amount originally allocated to IPR&D and restated its third-quarter 1998 consolidated financial statements accordingly, considering the SEC's views.
In 2006, Avid entered the shared storage market with Interplay and Unity. Combined with Media Composer, this became a milestone workflow for network television and film studios.
In February 2018, Avid appointed Jeff Rosica as CEO, after terminating Louis Hernandez Jr, who was accused of workplace misconduct.
In November 2023, Avid Technology was acquired by an affiliate of STG for $1.4 billion. This process delisted Avid from the public stock exchange, making it private.
In April 2024, Avid appointed Wellford Dillard as CEO, succeeding Jeff Rosica.

## Awards

1993: The National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences awarded Avid Technology and all of the company's initial employees with a technical Emmy award for Outstanding Engineering Development for the Avid Media Composer video editing system.
1998: Avid received an Emmy Award recognizing the real-time multi-camera grouping option in the Media Composer and Film Composer digital editing systems.
1999: At the 71st Academy Awards, Avid Technology Inc. was awarded an Oscar for the concept, system design and engineering of the Avid Film Composer for motion picture editing which was accepted by founder Bill Warner.
2000: Avid received an Emmy Award recognizing outstanding achievement in technological advancement for broadcast-quality PC video and compression plug-in cards.
2001: Digidesign receives a technical Grammy Award from the National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences.
2004: Digidesign receives an Oscar statuette representing the 2003 Scientific and Technical Award for the design, development and implementation of the Pro Tools digital audio workstation. The award marks one of the few times in the 76-year history of the Academy that a company is honored with more than one Oscar statuette, and that an audio company is recognized with a statuette for its contributions to the film industry.
2008: Digidesign ICON integrated console earns the Cinema Audio Society Technical Achievement Award.
2008: Pinnacle Studio Ultimate 11 receives PC Magazine’s Editors’ Choice award for Consumer Video Editing Software bringing the number of consumer and retail awards received by the Pinnacle Studio product line to 36 since its May 2007 release.
2009: Avid Media Composer was recognized by American Cinema Editors (ACE) Board of Directors with the Board’s first-ever ACE Technical Excellence Award which recognized the software as the preferred choice of the industry’s most acclaimed editors.
2010: Avid was honored by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences with an Engineering Plaque for Avid Media Access (AMA) for its role in dramatically improving the process of working with tapeless media – by eliminating time-consuming transcoding processes and saving time and money in the production process.
2010: Avid received the Philo T. Farnsworth Award for outstanding achievement in engineering development.
2022: Avid NEXIS | Edge and Media Composer took home TVB Europe and TV Technology's NAB Best in Market Awards.
2023: NEXIS | F2 SSD won NAB Show Product of the Year Award.

## Acquisitions

| Acquired | Company | Details | Sold |
| 1993 | EditDroid | A computerized analog non-linear editing (NLE) system which was developed by Lucasfilm spin-off company. | |
| 1993 | DiVA Corporation | developer of Videoshop, Quicktime-based home video editing software | |
| 1994 | Digidesign | developer of Pro Tools, digital audio workstation, and Venue, brand of digital mixing consoles | |
| 1994 | Basys | ITN's newsroom computer and automation system (from Digital Equipment Corporation), then implemented into iNews in 2001 | |
| 1994 | Newsview | Novell-based newsroom computer system | |
| 1995 | Elastic Reality, Inc. | developer of Elastic Reality, morphing software | |
| 1995 | Parallax Software | developer of Matador, Illusion and Jester, ink-and-paint software | |
| 1998 | Softimage | developer of Softimage|3D, 3D graphics software (previously subsidiary of Microsoft) | 2008 (to Autodesk) |
| 1998 | NewStar | strategic alliance Avstar with Grass Valley—then owners of Lightworks | |
| 2000 | Motion Factory | developer of interactive 3D software for games and the Web | |
| 2000 | Pluto Technology | DDR playback servers | |
| 2002 | iKnowledge | developer of Active Content Manager, newsroom management software | |
| 2003 | Rocket Networks | private sharing network technology for Internet collaboration, then implemented in Digidelivery, encrypted file transfer system | 2007 (to Aspera) |
| 2004 | NXN | Media Asset Management software components | |
| 2004 | Bomb Factory | audio plug-ins developer | |
| 2004 | M-Audio | audio interfaces and equipment manufacturer | 2012 (to inMusic) |
| 2005 | Pinnacle Systems | digital video hardware and software manufacturer | 2012 (to Corel) |
| 2005 | Wizoo | virtual instrument, plug-in effect and sample library designer; developed AIR (Advanced Instrument Research), series of plug-ins and virtual instruments subsequently included in Pro Tools | 2012 (to inMusic) |
| 2006 | Medéa Corporation | high-speed RAID storage manufacturer | |
| 2006 | Sundance Digital | broadcast automation software | |
| 2006 | Sibelius Software | developer of Sibelius, notation software | |
| 2006 | Maximum Throughput | developer of MAXedit, visual effects editing software | |
| 2010 | Blue Order Solutions AG | Media asset management software | |
| 2010 | Euphonix | digital mixing console and control surface manufacturer; EuCon protocols were integrated into Pro Tools; the Artist Series and System 5 Family were added to Avid control surfaces | |
| 2012 | Rocket Network | provides online music recording studios | |
| 2015 | Orad Systems | developer of 3D real-time graphics and video servers products, then integrated into the MediaCentral Platform | |
| 2024 | Wolftech | provider of story-centric workflow management solutions to large broadcasters, enhancing collaboration and efficiency in news gathering & story creation | |