Video Island drives into Europe with acquisition of Brafilm, the Nordic’s largest player
Video Island consolidates its leading position as Europe's largest online DVD rental business

London, 12 September 2005: Video Island, the UK's leading online DVD rental service today announced that it is acquiring Brafilm, the largest player in Scandinavia. Through the acquisition Video Island secures the No.1 position in three markets - UK, Sweden and Norway – extending its lead as the biggest online DVD rental business in Europe.

Today's announcement follows on from the successful UK acquisitions of DVDs365 in June 2005 and ScreenSelect.co.uk in August 2004 and confirms Video Island's ambition to become the number one online rental operator across Europe after becoming the biggest and best in the UK. This European acquisition provides a solid platform for Video Island to extend its leadership beyond the UK and into Europe, a growing market, already worth 2.2bn[1].

Video Island will have an unrivalled position in Europe, with a base of over 150,000 members. As the clear leader online in the UK marketplace, Video Island through its subscription service is handling almost 2 million DVD shipments per month, shipping nearly two DVDs per second, equivalent to over 300 high street stores and delivering around 35 times more unique films per week than are transmitted by broadcaster Sky Digital. The acquisition offers huge operational and marketing opportunities whilst providing the first foot-print outside of the UK.

Video Island, which announced an additional £5m of funding earlier this year to bring the total raised to date to £15m, is one of the only online DVD rental businesses in Europe that has secured significant blue-chip venture capital backing.

Simon Calver, CEO of Video Island commented, 'We are delighted to be adding Brafilm, the leading player in Sweden and Norway, to our business at this stage in our European growth. Brafilm is a well-established and respected player in Scandinavia and has some valuable partnerships including MSN, TV4 in Sweden, TV2 in Norway and Coop. The acquisition provides a solid base for us to expand across Europe.'

Jan Friedman, Chairman of Brafilm added, 'Video Island is the recognised leader in Europe for innovation and growth. Together with Brafilm there will be no other European based online DVD rental company in our league. We both share the same passion of providing excellent customer service, the best range of titles and having strong partners.'

[1] Screen Digest, European Video Software Markets, 01 July 2004
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Video Island (Merged with ScreenSelect)
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Company profile of Video Island (Merged with ScreenSelect)
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