Emblaze Acquires UCnGO

TEL AVIV -- Emblaze Systems Ltd (‘Emblaze’), the leading provider of rich media solutions over Wireless and IP networks, today announced that it has reached an agreement for the acquisition of all assets and operations of UCnGO Inc. and UCnGO 2000 Ltd. The overall consideration of the acquisition is approximately $3.6 million in a cash and Emblaze shares combination. The acquisition will not have an effect on Emblaze's burn of cash or operational expenses.

UCnGO has developed unique technological capabilities that allow smart media trans-coding i.e. changing image or media characteristic/compression attributes when being transported between different types of cell-phones or other devices. As an example, such capabilities are essential in the Multimedia Messaging Services (MMS) for adapting images sent from one phone to another when the two phones do not share identical features (i.e. have different screen sizes, use different compression methods or support a different number of colours). Such operations demand very complicated algorithmic image manipulations and have to be performed in real-time. UCnGO is comprised of top level specialists with many years of experience in image processing and manipulation in the space and satellite telecommunication industry.

In addition to the above, UCnGO has developed other MMS related technologies and has a strategic agreement in place with a leading global MMS provider. The acquisition will greatly enhance Emblaze's platform offering to carriers and MMS providers and will further strengthen its leadership in the provision of rich media delivery solutions over wireless networks.

UCnGO's products & technologies are complementary to the Emblaze solution and are essential for all types of media transfer services such as MMS and streaming media, that will be the basis for value added services in the 2.5G and 3G era. This technology will be embedded throughout the Emblaze Systems platform and will be used by almost all of its components.

Eli Reifman, Chief Executive Officer of Emblaze said: "These are difficult times for the telecom and high-tech industries but on the other hand these times present great opportunities for companies like Emblaze and UCnGO to join forces and leverage each other’s capabilities. Israel has great technology and this company represents its finest. We see this acquisition as a strategic move planned to increase our technological lead over potential competition and an addition of quality minds to our family. This deal will enable us to offer a winning combination to the telecom companies for rich media delivery solutions over next generation networks."

Emblaze Systems