AOpen, MMD Co-Tap North American Digital Billboard Market

Taipei, March 14, 2011 (CENS)--AOpen Inc. and Multimedia Display (MMD), which is wholly owned by LCD monitor maker TPV Technology Group, recently announced their collaboration on tapping the North American market for digital billboards.

As MMD already signed brand license agreement with Philips, becoming the exclusive company to sell Philips branded LCD monitors and public signage displays worldwide, AOPen is estimated to quickly gain ground in the North American market via Philips distribution channels and brand. Industry executives estimated North America to become major driver of AOpen's revenue growth this year.

They pointed out that AOpen has secured contracts that will keep its production lines inundated until the second quarter due partly to its cooperation with Philips in Europe.

AOpen has set up complete supply chain in Taiwan for its digital billboard production, making it able to supply digital engines that work with MMD monitors in the cooperation deal. Retailers of AOpen products pointed out that the company's shipments of digital engines for the first quarter will grow two folds from the same quarter of last year, considerably boosting its profit as gross margin of the engine is much higher than that of PC products.

Industry watchers estimated digital-billboard prosperity to spread from Europe and North America into mainland China, giving a big boost to AOpen as it is developing strong presences in all of these markets. They pointed out that mainland Chinese authorities have been systematically promoting digital billboard installations, with prominent cases including the projects in 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, Shanghai Expo 2010 and Guangzhou Asian Games 2010. Now, digital board has been included in the 12th Five-Year Development Plan as part of a triple-play telecom project.