Macromedia Announces Studio 8; New Suite Offers Advanced Design, Development, and Maintenance Tools from Desktop to Mobile

Macromedia, Inc. (Nasdaq:MACR) today announcedMacromedia Studio 8, the essential suite for web designers,developers, video professionals, and graphic artists to design,develop, and maintain interactive online experiences. Combining thelatest releases of award-winning Macromedia Dreamweaver(R), MacromediaFlash(R) Professional, and Macromedia Fireworks(R), and keyproductivity tools Macromedia Contribute(TM) and MacromediaFlashPaper(TM), Studio 8 offers a new level of expressiveness,efficiency, and simplified workflow to create websites, interactivemedia, and mobile content. For more information about Studio 8, pleasevisit http://www.macromedia.com/software/studio.

"Studio 8 is a huge leap forward," said Stephen Elop, chiefexecutive officer, Macromedia. "There are tremendous improvements tofeatures and performance allowing designers and developers to buildand deliver more expressive and compelling experiences for the web anddevices in less time than ever before. Our beta testers worldwideagree: this release will fundamentally change the way people thinkabout the creation and delivery of digital content."

Studio 8 contains workflow enhancements, new products, and featurefirsts. The addition of Contribute and FlashPaper allows designers anddevelopers a streamlined approach to maintaining web content, makingthe upkeep of sites created with the suite even more cost effective.Studio 8 also includes groundbreaking new video encoding tools, whichgive customers an easier method for creating and publishinghigh-quality interactive video for truly memorable online experiences.New CSS enhancements and visual authoring tools for XML add style andsophistication to websites and applications. New tools for authoringand testing mobile content give Studio 8 the market lead in helpingbusinesses reach the widest audience possible across multipleplatforms.

"Macromedia technology has helped us realize our main design goalfor the Toyota Hybrid City site -- to promote a better understandingof Toyota's hybrid technology among our customers," said YoshitakaHirano, assistant manager, Domestic Advertising & Marketing Div.,Toyota Motor Corporation. "I expect the new expressive features ofStudio 8, including advanced visual effects and video integration,will allow us to communicate Toyota's advanced technology via anunparalleled web experience which is both entertaining andeducational."

The Studio 8 suite and its individual products are key applicationcomponents of the Macromedia Flash Platform for delivering the mosteffective experiences for rich content, applications, andcommunications across browsers, operating systems, and devices.

Dreamweaver 8 (announced today, see separate release) isMacromedia's latest release of the industry-leading tool for designingand developing websites and applications. New Dreamweaver 8 featuresinclude expanded Cascading Style Sheet (CSS) layout visualization foreasier design, drag-and-drop integration of XML data feeds, improvedcode hinting support for XML and XSLT, enhanced usability featuressuch as zoom and code collapse to streamline the development process,and easier ways to incorporate Flash Video content onto websites.

Flash Professional 8 (announced today, see separate release) marksa significant release for Flash, the industry's most advancedauthoring environment for creating interactive websites, digitalexperiences, and mobile content. Improved graphics performance, newgraphic effects capabilities, new animation controls, script editorusability, Flash Video features, and workflow integration with leadingvideo editing and encoding tools allow the creation of rich, immersivecontent for the web that was not possible before. Flash Professional 8is the professional authoring environment for the Internet's mostwidely distributed rich client runtime, Flash Player.

Fireworks 8 (announced today, see separate release) offers manynew and improved features. Graphic designers and web applicationdevelopers can now create interactive CSS-style pop-up menus,experiment with more than 25 new blend modes, import new file formats,and experience improved roundtrip editing with Dreamweaver 8 and FlashProfessional 8.

Studio 8 is rounded out by the addition of Contribute 3 andFlashPaper 2 to better fulfill the workflow needs of users. Contribute3 lets web professionals modify or update content in a controlled,template-based workflow that improves efficiency while preservingwebsite integrity. FlashPaper 2 extends the content creation processby converting any file type into web-ready PDF or SWF file formats.

As the backbone of the Flash Platform, Flash Player 8 (publicpre-release announced today, see separate release) is a major updateto the ubiquitous runtime environment. Flash Player 8 includes ahigher quality video codec, an advanced text-rendering engine, and animproved security model and privacy controls to offer unprecedentedperformance in a lightweight runtime player. Flash Player is currentlyinstalled on over 600 million desktops and mobile devices globally.

"Designers, developers, video professionals, and graphic artistsrely on specialized tools that help them express their creativity andwork efficiently," said Tom Dwyer, research director, Yankee Group."The well-integrated tools within Macromedia Studio 8 take advantageof industry-standard technologies, improve workflows, and go a longway toward helping media and web professionals remain productive,profitable, competitive, and successful."

PRICING AND AVAILABILITY

Macromedia Studio 8 is expected to ship in September. Localizedversions in German, French, Japanese, Spanish, Italian, Korean,Traditional Chinese, and Simplified Chinese will be available shortlythereafter. Pricing is $999 for a full license (NA commercial) and$399 for an upgrade (NA commercial). Education, government, and volumepricing is available. To learn more about purchasing options, pleasevisit http://www.macromedia.com/software/studio.

ABOUT MACROMEDIA

Experience matters. Macromedia believes that great experiencesbuild great businesses. Our software empowers millions of businessusers, developers, and designers to create and deliver effective,compelling, and memorable experiences -- on the Internet, on fixedmedia, on wireless, and on digital devices.

INDUSTRY LEADERS ENDORSE MACROMEDIA STUDIO 8

Digital Content Institute, Ministry of Economic Affairs, Taiwan

The technology, market reputation, and reach of Macromedia Studio8 will play an important role in helping us achieve ourgovernment-mandated mission of making Taiwan a global leader indigital content development. Our e-Taiwan Project specifies milestonesin five major categories: broadband Internet access, e-society,e-industry, e-government and opportunities. Because Dreamweaver,Flash, and Fireworks meet our web expectations and needs quite well,especially regarding the production of multimedia interactive webapplications, Studio 8 will play an important role in our initiativesto establish a digital content community in Taiwan with truly globalreach.

-- G.J. Huang, Ph.D., director, Digital Content Industry Promotion Office, Ministry of Economic Affairs, Taiwan

Goowy Mail

We launched goowy mail as a free web mail service to offer emailusers an experience unlike any they have had with traditional web mailclients. Goowy provides users an innovative and intuitive interfacefor managing email, contacts, calendar and games. Our technicalchallenge was to deploy this advanced functionality in a web front endthat works across multiple platforms and browsers and is responsiveand fun for users. Macromedia Flash Professional 8 was the bestvehicle for delivering our vision for Goowy. We are excited about theexcellent response we have received on the application from the usercommunity as illustrated by direct feedback and a rapidly growing userbase.

-- Alex Bard, CEO, Goowy Mail

India Games, Ltd.

As a leading global publisher and developer of games acrossvarious platforms such as the Internet, PCs, mobile phones, PDAs,handheld gaming devices, and consoles, Indiagames plans to useMacromedia Flash 8 to achieve quicker development, compellinggraphics, and platform-independent content. Flash was particularlyimportant for us to create the visually rich and engaging game playexperience in our game Cryptic Capers. Our products are publishedacross leading platforms including Macromedia Flash Lite, Symbian,Java, and i-mode, which helps us build distribution partnershipsacross the globe with major international mobile operators.

-- Vishal Gondal, founder & CEO, Indiagames Ltd.

Mercuity Software

Macromedia Flash helps us focus on ticketing in the performingarts instead of wrestling with technology to make it happen. The NewYork Philharmonic's online ticketing system wouldn't be nearly ascustomer-friendly if the Flash front end didn't connect so seamlesslywith our back-end databases and with XML. I'm amazed that we were ableto build such a complicated application in Flash as quickly as wecould with as few resources as we had.

-- Tim Ryan, president, Mercuity

Real Branding

Building online experiences with Macromedia Flash helps ourclients establish a web presence that delivers tangible results. Ourredesigned site for Lipton tea, for example, helps educate consumersabout the healthful benefits of tea, has increased online sales andachieved significant call center savings. Flash Professional 8 willplay an integral part in bringing our clients' brands to life online.

-- Jason Bucky, creative director, Real Branding

Tennessee Technological University

Students in our Bachelor of Science degree program in web designuse Macromedia Studio to improve the higher end of theircontent-creation and design expertise. The new features in Studio 8will help them to improve further. We find that critical thinkingskills, a solid grounding of a broad art and science education, andthe ability to grasp and utilize the best methodologies and softwaretools like Studio 8 prepare them for the world of work.

-- Robert J. Clougherty, Jr., Ph.D., director of the web design program, College of Arts and Sciences, Tennessee Technological University

University of Missouri School of Journalism

This is the first digital generation, and technology is changingtheir lives. Studio 8 tools help to improve their fluency inmanipulating digital content.

-- Brian Brooks, professor and associate dean, University of Missouri School of Journalism

Copyright 2005 Macromedia, Inc. All rights reserved. Macromedia,the Macromedia logo, Macromedia Contribute, Macromedia Dreamweaver,Macromedia Flash, Macromedia FlashPaper, and Macromedia Fireworks aretrademarks or registered trademarks of Macromedia, Inc., which may beregistered in the United States and internationally. Other product orservice names mentioned herein are the trademarks of their respectiveowners