eMotion Announces Sale of PictureQuest to Creatas
Sale a result of company's long-term strategy to
focus on software
VIENNA, Va., July 31, 2001 eMotion, Inc., the global leader in digital media management (DMM) solutions, today announced that it has sold its PictureQuest content business to Creatas LLC. PictureQuest joins Creatas' other wholly owned subsidiary, Dynamic Graphics of Peoria, IL. Dynamic Graphics markets a number of products and services to the creative community. PictureQuest is the premier portal for rights-protected and royalty-free images. eMotion will continue to remain actively involved with PictureQuest via a long-term hosting agreement to manage PictureQuest's content on eMotion's MediaPartnerT4.0 software. Terms of the deal are undisclosed.
PictureQuest is the largest, independent business-to-business stock imagery portal in the world, having grown by a factor of ten during the past three years. As it established market dominance, it became an attractive acquisition candidate.
"PictureQuest gave us a real-time laboratory for the development of our market-leading digital media management software, and a window on customer requirements and behavior," said Bob Griffin, president and CEO of eMotion Inc. "But with the successful launch of MediaPartnerT 4.0 and our ability to provide enterprise-scale hosting on the MediaPartner platform, that portion of our photographic licensing business is no longer strategic to eMotion's development.
"We view the sale of PictureQuest as the best-case scenario for eMotion, PictureQuest and Creatas," Griffin continued. "We are proud of the PictureQuest brand and business, and for what it demonstrates about eMotion's leadership in digital media management products and services. That is why our agreement with Creatas provides for protection of the PictureQuest brand."
Terms for eMotion's agreement to sell PictureQuest included a requirement that eMotion remain involved with the technology and continue hosting the site, and that the acquiring company would provide a path forward for personnel and keep the PictureQuest brand intact.
"The acquisition of PictureQuest is inline with our business goals of becoming a leader in the creative services market," said David Moffly, chief executive officer of Creatas. "PictureQuest is the premier portal of stock imagery on the Web and by continuing to work in partnership with eMotion to run PictureQuest, we at Creatas can take advantage of the tremendous strength of this leader in the growing digital media management industry."
"MediaPartner 4.0 has gained substantial market acceptance over the past two quarters. The sale of PictureQuest is a very smart move by management to sell a non-core business on very attractive terms, allowing eMotion to focus on building momentum for its core digital asset management product," said John Flannery, managing director of GE Equity, an eMotion investor.
"eMotion investors support this corporate streamlining as a mature and appropriate implementation of the long-term strategic plan for the company," said Diana Murphy of Chartwell Capital, who is also a member of the eMotion Board of Directors. "As eMotion has expanded recently into the UK and has begun to see significant traction with their MediaPartner product, the time is right to put all of the focus on the continued growth of our software business."
Employees of PictureQuest that transfer to Creatas include sales and content personnel. They will become Creatas employees immediately and will receive some transition services over the next 2-3 months.
For more information, contact press@emotion.com
About eMotion, Inc.
eMotion, Inc. is the global leader in digital media management
software and services, with customers among Global 2000 brand-focused
companies; the advertising industry; entertainment and broadcast
industries and government agencies. eMotion MediaPartner™ 4.0,
the company's patented out-of-the
box software solution, powers the entire lifecycle of media management,
from creation and collaboration to searching, storage and distribution.
The technology is available either as a product license or in a
hosted environment. eMotion is headquartered in Washington, DC with
offices in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago, New York, London
and Birmingham (U.K.). Most recently, President and CEO Bob Griffin
was named the 2001 Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year in
the software category for the Greater Washington area.
About Creatas
Creatas LLC ("Creatas") is a vertically integrated, media/marketing
business selling stock images (photography, illustration and film),
publications, education and other high quality value added products
and services in the creative services industry. Its principal subsidiary,
Dynamic Graphics, Inc. was acquired in December 2000. Dynamic Graphics,
headquartered in Peoria, Illinois, is a leading provider of visual
content, knowledge, publications and solutions for the graphic design
community, operating in four segments – subscription art services,
royalty free image content, trade publications and education. The
company offers custom-quality royalty-free images under the Creatas
brand (www.creatas.com). It produces three monthly art-and-idea
subscription services: Clipper®, Designer’s Club® and
Print Media. It creates three widely distributed publications for
professional graphic designers: Step-By-Step Graphics® magazine,
Dynamic Graphics Magazine® and SBS Digital Design®. And
it provides hands-on graphics training at its headquarters in Peoria
and in major cities across the United States through Dynamic Graphics
Training. The company has offices in New York City, London and Sydney.
