BURLINGAME, Calif., Aug. 27, 2007 (PRIME NEWSWIRE) -- Virgin America, the new start-up airline, today announced that it has inked deals with TV JAPAN, Venevision International, KBS-America, TVB and Emphasis (Hong Kong) to supply a wide array of inflight programming in Japanese, Spanish, Korean, Mandarin and Cantonese. Virgin America's guests will now have access to the most foreign language films and television entertainment on any U.S. domestic airline.
Virgin America launched service on August 8th and already has agreements with Disney, Fox, Paramount Pictures, Universal Studios, Sony Pictures Entertainment, Terry Steiner International and Warner Brothers to provide major theatrical content at every seat and on every flight through the Red(tm) Inflight Entertainment System. In addition to English language choices, Red(tm) will now deliver exciting film, television and audio programming in Cantonese, Mandarin, Japanese, Korean and Spanish.
"The cities that Virgin America serves are incredibly diverse, so it is critical that our onboard entertainment offerings are just as varied and sophisticated," said Charles Ogilvie, Virgin America's Director of Inflight Entertainment & Partnerships. "From San Francisco to New York, Los Angeles, Washington DC and Las Vegas -- we hope that our multilingual guests will be pleasantly surprised when they see content available in their native languages."
Red(tm) is the airline's industry leading onboard entertainment system and offers guests 'pay-per-view' movies, live TV via satellite, a wide array of audio music entertainment including the ability to compile individual playlists, a selection of electronic games and even meals on-demand.
"One of the most important goals of TV JAPAN is to deepen the understanding of Japanese culture among people in North America and our company is pleased to have been selected by Virgin America," said Susumu Tanimura, President, Japan Network Group, Inc. "As the first and only U.S. airline to provide TV JAPAN programs on domestic flights, our network is proud to hand-select shows of the highest-quality to feature as part of Red(tm)."
"The launch of Virgin America marks the beginning of a new order in U.S. domestic aviation. Everyone at KBS is very proud to be part of creating this monumental move," said JiYoung 'Jay' Noh, COO and CFO of KBS America. "We're thrilled to see Hallyu (Korean Wave) fly on Red(tm) on this Wednesday's first Virgin America flight from Los Angeles to New York."
"We are excited to provide our premium Hispanic in-flight entertainment solution for the fastest growing segment of the U.S. population on the most advanced in-flight entertainment system in the U.S. skies," said Roy Meyeringh, Venevision International's Director of Multiplatform VOD Film Distribution. "Now anyone can navigate the best collection of hit films originally produced in Spanish with English subtitles from Latin America and Spain and begin screening their own personal international film festival right from their seat."
"Emphasis is ecstatic that it can help bring top Asian directors, actors and actresses from across the world to Red(tm)," said Jovita Joh, Emphasis Deputy Managing Director. "For the first time ever a U.S. domestic airline has tasked us with looking at everything from asian independent films to Golden Horse, Hong Kong Critics Society, Hong Kong Film, Grand Bell and Japanese Academy Awards winners on its flights."
About Virgin America:
As San Francisco's hometown airline, Virgin America will serve as many as 10 cities within a year of operation, and up to 30 cities within five years. Virgin America's brand-new planes will offer guests interactive in-flight entertainment systems, plugs for laptops and other portable electronics, the ability to order food or chat with other guests from their own video-screen and a host of other features aimed at bringing a little fun back to flying. www.virginamerica.com
The Virgin America logo is available at http://www.primenewswire.com/newsroom/prs/?pkgid=2371
About TV JAPAN
Japan Network Group, Inc.(JNG), was the first Japanese TV network established in the U.S. and now in its 17th year, remains the only 24-hour Japanese-language TV broadcaster in North America. JNG operates a premium, subscription-based channel called TV JAPAN with a viewership of approximately 25% of the 1 million Japanese and Japanese-descendant population living in North America. TV JAPAN is highly regarded among the Japanese communities of North America for bringing into their homes a lifeline of live news reports and a variety of entertainment and educational programs to enhance the understanding of contemporary Japanese culture. TV JAPAN also serves as a guest amenity in an elite group of 300 hotels / 135,000 rooms in North America. For more information about what's on and where to watch the TV JAPAN channel, please visit www.tvjapan.net
About KBS
The Korean Broadcasting System (KBS) is the sole public broadcaster of Korea. Since its first broadcasting station in 1947, KBS has been the country's leader in program production and audience service, spearheading developments in television, radio and broadcast technology. Currently, KBS operates two terrestrial channels, one satellite TV channel and seven radio channels, including a multi-lingual channel. KBS maintains a nationwide network comprised of 18 local stations, eleven overseas bureaus and six subsidiary companies. For more information about KBS, please visit http://kbs.co.kr
About KBS America
KBS America, located in Los Angeles, was established in August, 2004 as the U.S. division of KBS. KBS America has been successfully expanding carriage of KBS World on terrestrial, cable and satellite platforms in the U.S. For more information about KBS America, please visit http://www.kbs-america.com/
About KBS World
KBS World programming consists of the most popular shows airing on KBS' two broadcast networks in Korea, including highly-rated dramas, in-depth documentaries, breaking news, as well as fun and useful entertainment and sports programs. As an attraction for English speaking audiences, most programs are subtitled in English. For more information about KBS World, please visit http://world.kbs.co.kr.
Venevision International
Venevision International is an entertainment production and distribution company part of the Cisneros Group of Companies. Established more than 30 years ago, its activities are an integral part of the business development strategy designed by Gustavo Cisneros, Chairman and CEO of the Cisneros Group of Companies. Venevision International is a global distributor of television programming and is one of the largest independent producers of Spanish-language television programs in the world. Venevision International also distributes Spanish-language films for theater, in-flight entertainment, pay-per-view, video on demand, IPTV, home video, paid and free television in the United States, where it also broadcasts its pay TV movie channel "VeneMovies". It participates in the music market through its own record labels Vene Music and Siente Music, in wireless entertainment with its companies Venemobile and Latcel and produces and distributes "audio books" through "Fonolibro". Venevision International is also a pioneer in the area of "advertainment" (product integration) through its Synapsis International unit. About Venevision International: www.venevisioninternational.com
Emphasis
Headquartered in Hong Kong, Emphasis is a subsidiary of PubliGroupe, the world's largest advertising sales company with more than 50 offices in 25 countries. Emphasis creates 26 publications in ten languages for ten major clients with a combined annual readership of more than sixty-five million. Meanwhile, Emphasis Video Entertainment (EVE) serves more than 30 airlines with inflight entertainment services including Asian films and TV content distribution, daily news feed, and post production services such as digital encoding, duplication, subtitling and dubbing. EVE is the largest and only inflight distributor of Chinese, Japanese, and Korean language movies and Asian Content / TV programs and is the only facility in Asia that supports inflight post-production services. For more information about Emphasis, please visit http://www.emphasis.net/
TVB
Hong Kong-based TVBI Company Limited (TVBI) is the worldwide operating arm of Television Broadcasts Limited (TVB), the world's largest producer and distributor of Chinese-language programming. TVB, together with TVBI, are headquartered in Hong Kong's Tseung Kwan O Industrial Estate in the 2.2 billion state-of-the-art TVB City, Asia's largest commercial television production and operations centre. There are two outdoor shooting locations and 22 production studios, of which Studio 1 is the largest studio amongst all commercial television stations in Asia, in TVB City. TVB employs 4,585 staff (both local and oversea) and artistes. TVB productions range from serial dramas and sitcoms to documentaries, news, musical specials, variety and talk shows and travelogues. Established in 1976, TVBI enjoys exclusive rights to distribute the more than 6,000 hours of programs produced annually by TVB as well as titles from TVB's famed 80,000-hour program library. For more information, please visit http://www.tvb.com/