Kevin J. Yeaman
Analyst · Dougherty & Company
Thank you, Murray. Good afternoon, everyone. On today's call, I would like to highlight our significant progress in bringing premium audio experiences to the cloud. Most recently, we announced today that Dolby Digital Plus will be incorporated in Windows 8. This is a significant step towards delivering a premium audio experience to online content and portable devices. I'd also like to highlight some of the compelling new technologies we're introducing to further improve the audio and video experiences and Dolby's exciting new branding opportunity. The entertainment industry we serve is at an inflection point, creating new opportunities for Dolby. With the rapid rise in online delivery and the growth of portable playback devices, consumers can now receive content anytime, anywhere. This is leading to a world of billions of playback devices. As more content becomes available online, consumers are increasingly seeking premium media experiences. However, the industry is challenged to deliver this given the complex ecosystem of operating systems, content platforms, chipset makers and device manufacturers. We believe this creates an opportunity for Dolby to ensure a consistent premium audio experience just as we've done in the cinema, in optical disc and in broadcast. In order to achieve this vision, we are focused on delivering value from content creation to content consumption. This includes providing tools and services for content creators, encoding tools for online service providers and decoders and post-processing technologies for chipset makers, operating system providers and device manufacturers. By focusing on these critical elements across the chain, the industry and the consumer can be assured a high-quality and differentiated experience just as we have done in other channels. During the quarter, we have made significant progress working across this ecosystem. Today, we announced that Microsoft will incorporate Dolby decoding and encoding technologies for online and file-based content into all versions of Windows 8. In addition, this agreement will provide OEMs a path to supporting optical disc playback on PCs. This is a significant step forward in our efforts to bring premium media experiences to the cloud. This agreement ensures the presence of our format and the Windows' ecosystem beyond DVD and creates the opportunity to bring a differentiated audio experience to Windows-based PCs and tablets. There are a couple of important details to the agreement that should be noted. First, PC OEMs, will be required to directly license and pay Dolby a base royalty rate in exchange for the rights to use Dolby technologies in all channels of content other than DVD or digital broadcast. For those PCs where OEMs wish to also support DVD or digital TV playback, and OEM will pay a higher per-unit rate consistent with what we have received for DVD playback in prior Windows cycles. This will enable to support Dolby Digital Plus across all content channels and applications. In addition to our progress in the PC ecosystem, we continue to grow the adoption of our technologies on smartphones and remain on track for our multichannel formats to be on the smartphone shipments in the low- to mid-teens. Our multichannel technology is now and over approximately 200 handset models, with Samsung shipping over 30 models, including its flagship Galaxy 2S and Galaxy Note. We also continue to make progress growing the adoption of our post-processing portfolio with Dolby PCEE technologies now included in over 500 PC and tablet SKUs worldwide, and with over 100 million units of PCEE-enabled products shipped to date. In the second quarter, the world's second-largest PC OEM, Lenovo, announced that it would expand PCEE v4 across most of its IdeaPad and ThinkPad notebook models. We are also making strong progress extending our formats to online and cloud-based devices. Leading cloud-encoding providers including Microsoft's Windows Azure Media Services, Encoding.com, Zencoder, Digital Rapids, Nativ and LinkoTec, will include Dolby Digital Plus in their platforms to support premium video content to devices. These wins expand on the adoption of our multichannel formats by leading online content providers Netflix, Amazon, VUDU, HBO Go, Apple TV, and the CinemaNow service. At this year's Mobile World Congress, Voddler, a leading cloud-based video-on-demand provider, announced that it would begin streaming content in Dolby Digital Plus to select Nokia devices that contain our playback technologies. We estimate that approximately 115,000 pieces of content across these online services are encoded in our multichannel format. As our technologies gain share in portable devices, and we extend our formats to online and mobile content, we are closer to our goal of delivering a premium experience to consumers however and wherever they consume their content. In tandem with our efforts in online and portable, we continue to expand the presence of Dolby Digital Plus globally across digital broadcast. In the second quarter, leading European pay-TV provider, Canal Plus, launched on-air in Dolby Digital Plus in France. Finally, we are focused on introducing new technologies that help content creators and artists capture, deliver and render a more immersive experience for consumers whether in the theater, in the home or on the go. At the recently held CinemaCon, we announced our next generation audio platform, Dolby Atmos, to industry-wide enthusiasm. Atmos is a breakthrough technology that delivers a more natural and realistic sound field, which transports people into the story with a lifelike sensory experience. We believe Atmos has the potential to significantly change the theater experience, and we are pleased that Pixar's Brave will be the first film to test Dolby Atmos. At NAB, we also showcased Dolby 3D, our HD 3D solution in collaboration with Philips. We believe Dolby 3D solved two important problems in the industry. First, it is designed to enable a full resolution, glasses-free 3D experience for 3D devices, enabling consumers to eliminate the need for 3D glasses. Second, it allows bandwidth constrained platforms, such as broadcast and online, to deliver a full resolution 3D experience at only marginally higher data rates. And I'm happy to report this week's other exciting news. The announcement of the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, home of the Academy Awards. The Dolby Theatre will be a world stage for Dolby's innovations and technologies for decades to come. Through the Dolby Theatre and the televised events, social media, PR and promotional opportunities associated with it, we'll be able to share the incredible impact that Dolby has on entertainment from cinema to broadcast, to online and social media. We look forward to rolling out Dolby Atmos and Dolby 3D in the Dolby Theatre in the coming months. In summary, we made excellent progress throughout the quarter, introducing exciting new technologies that help artists and content creators capture, deliver and render compelling new experiences. We also continue to make excellent progress extending our technologies throughout the online and mobile ecosystem so that content creators and artists can deliver the experience they intend across all portable devices. By gaining the adoption of Dolby Digital Plus in Windows for online and file-based content, we have taken a major step forward in this vision. With that, I'll turn it over to questions.