Sonic Solutions announced Thursday that it is partnering with Fujisoft to deliver content from its Roxio CinemaNow broadband video-on-demand service to the Nintendo Wii game console (note: Sonic acquired the CinemaNow service last November and subsequently added the name "Roxio" to its branding). The content--initially comprised of new releases and library titles from Paramount Pictures--will be offered under the auspices of Minna no Theater Wii ("Everyone's Theater Wii"), a Fujisoft VOD service for the Japanese Wii market. Sonic and Fujisoft say that they will continue to work together to expand the line-up of content available for the service, which they claim provides "virtually instant" streaming to the television set. "Fujisoft is a renowned technology thought leader and major supplier of embedded software for everything from mobile devices to digital home electronics, so we are extremely pleased to be collaborating with them to bring Hollywood movies to the Wii," Mark Ely, Sonic's EVP of strategy, said in a prepared statement. "Thanks to this new relationship with Fujisoft, consumers now have another convenient way to access high-quality entertainment from Roxio CinemaNow."
Sonic bills Roxio CinemaNow as offering a broad selection of movies and other content for rental or purchase, with many movies from major Hollywood studios available day-and-date with their DVD release. It says that Roxio CinemaNow's "cloud-based media services power devices from multiple manufacturers, forming a connected ecosystem that consumers can use to seamlessly choose, move and view video entertainment." Devices on which the service is available include Blu-ray Disc players from LG Electronics, PC's from Dell, and portable media players from Archos. The service also powers Internet movie delivery for Blockbuster and is instantly accessible through Bestbuy.com, the company says.
