Tag - :VIA

The Russell 2000 futures are higher and the index is set to open in positive territory following news of strong corporate earnings.

Nokia Corp. (NYSE: NOK), the world’s largest manufacturer of mobile phones, reported that its second-quarter profit more than doubled due to higher sales in fast-growth markets such as India and China.

Similarly, Viacom Inc. (NYSE: VIA) also beat analysts’ projections. The New York-based entertainment company’s net income fell to $434 million, or $0.63 per share, but still came in above Wall Street’s projected earnings of $0.50 per share. During the second quarter of 2006 the owner of MTV Networks and Paramount movie studios earned a profit of $437.3 million, or $0.61 per share.

Toronto-based Kaboose, Inc. (TSX: KAB) is North America's largest independent online media company in the kids-and-family market — a sector dominated by giants such as Walt Disney Co. (NYSE: DIS), Time Warner Inc.'s (NYSE: TWX) AOL unit and Viacom Inc.’s (NYSE: VIA) Nickelodeon. Solid planning, creative financing, strategic marketing, and sound partnerships have this small-cap standing strong in the face of stiff competition from larger competitors with well-oiled marketing machines.

Founded in 1999, right before the dot-com bust, Kaboose plowed full steam ahead, aggressively snapping up kid-oriented websites. After a round of acquisitions, the small media company conceded it would never win the battle for children's attention on the Internet, so it shifted gears and targeted their moms. Today, the company runs a string of content-related sites that focus on mothers and young families. Visitors to Kaboose's sites can do everything from staying informed of the latest trends and reading product and service reviews to planning birthday parties and family vacations to creating online photo scrapbooks.

With a Web portfolio including popular sites like BabyZone, ParentZone, Birthday in a Box, Two Peas in a Bucket and the recently acquired image-sharing service Bubbleshare, Kaboose's 120,000 pages of content attract 12 million unique visitors a month and its family of sites have more than 2 million registered users (return visitors who can be tracked and cross-promoted)—a fact that has brought advertisers knocking.

"Kaboose is one of only a handful of Canadian companies that is benefiting from the significant shift in advertising spending from traditional media to online media," Ron Shuttleworth of Jennings Capital Inc., said in a recent report.

"As the company scales and solidifies its position as a pre-eminent destination for families, we expect that Kaboose should capture more share of advertising budgets and higher rates," he wrote.

Last year, the advertising dollars poured in: Kaboose revenues swelled 200% to $11.7 million and in the third quarter of last year, the company recorded its first ever profit, $500,000 (a $1-million turnaround from the same period in 2005). All in all, sales have grown more than 1,000% since 2003. And the company has built an impressive list of business partners, including the likes of McDonald's Corp. (NYSE: MCD), Target Corporation (NYSE: TGT), Hewlett-Packard Company (NYSE: HPQ), DaimlerChrysler AG's (NYSE: DCX) Mercedes-Benz subsidiary, Mattel, Inc. (NYSE: MAT) and M.J. Heinz Company (NYSE: HNZ).

It would seem as though digital entertainment pervades our lives these days, from DVDs to digital satellite and cable television. But one medium still relies on old-fashioned silver halide film: the movies shown in your local theater.

Access Integrated Technology Inc. (Nasdaq: AIXD), launched in March of 2000, is trying to change that. AccessIT is the leader in installing digital equipment into theaters. Now it’s moving into distributing digital films to its equipment in the theaters. It acquired a private company, Big Picture, for about $4 million last quarter. Big Picture produces alternative digital entertainment, such as animated films and sports and concert events, enabling theaters to provide alternative programming to targeted audiences during slow times that normally attract very small audiences.

While most major research firms have so far ignored the space, several analysts covering the company believe the potential is huge. “I’m a believer in digital cinema,” says Jeff Van Rhee with Craig-Callum Capital. “There is absolutely an audience out there for alternative content.”

But AccessIT’s future could be bigger than an iMax double feature. It has distribution contracts with News Corp.’s 20th Century Fox (NYSE: NWS), Viacom, Inc.’s NYSE: VIA) Paramount Pictures and General Electric Company’s (NYSE: GE) Universal Studios. The studios currently help fund the theaters’ transition to digital, paying a fee every time a digital film is shown. So far AccessIT distributes mostly small films, but its executives have made it clear that transmitting feature films is on the digital horizon, predicting film distribution will be its largest revenue producer in five to seven years.