Benchmarking the Digital Household to be Released by Nielsen Entertainment Reports

Benchmarking the Digital Household to be Released by Nielsen Entertainment Reports

Larry Gerbrandt Is Named Nielsen Entertainment's Newly Appointed Senior Corporate Analyst and Author of the Digital Household Report

LOS ANGELES, Nov. 16 /PRNewswire/ -- Former Kagan COO Larry Gerbrandt has joined Nielsen Entertainment, it was announced today by Andy Wing, President and CEO, Nielsen Entertainment. Mr. Gerbrandt serves as Senior Vice President and Senior Corporate Analyst for Nielsen Entertainment, reporting to Mr. Wing. Among his first initiatives is Benchmarking the Digital Household from Nielsen Entertainment Reports, available for sale starting today. Digital Household explores a broad range of penetration benchmarks for how the American household uses media, entertainment, information technologies, and services. The report can be purchased by sending an email to Reports@NielsenEntertainment.com or by calling 323/817-1958.

In this new role, Mr. Gerbrandt will utilize Nielsen Entertainment's Actionable Entertainment Intelligence (AEI), the cross-section of data sets from Nielsen's consulting and measurement businesses covering film, television, on demand, interactive, live event, music, mobile, and book entertainment verticals, as well as data from sister companies Nielsen Media Research and Monitor Plus, to produce strategy-minded analyses on many of the complex questions facing entertainment executives today.

The first Nielsen Entertainment Report, Benchmarking the Digital Household is a distillation of eight years of regular, in-depth surveys in American households conducted by Nielsen Media Research. The report combines a thorough quantitative review of entertainment consumption with an overlay of strategic analysis; particularly leveraging Nielsen Entertainment's consulting expertise in the areas of film, television, mobile, video games.

Some examples of key trends from the analysis:

-- Though video game-owning households represent only about a third of the
U.S. total, they are a fiercely technophilic segment, with some of the
highest adoption rates of consumer electronics and services. These
homes-with a disproportionate number of children 17 or younger-are the
breeding ground for the heavy media consumers of tomorrow.

-- Two key technology adoption inflection points were identified: a slow
rate of growth until about 20% penetration and a second rapid expansion
to mass market adoption once the technology or service reached 40%
penetration.

-- Average movie attendance among the households surveyed has been falling
over the last eight years but the greatest falloff has come in the
heaviest movie-going segment-those that attend theaters more than once
a month. The steepest declines have been in the DVD-owning homes and
the broadband-enabled households.

-- A growing number of households are subscribing to both cable and
satellite services-with the percentage almost doubling over the last
few years.

-- Some 80% of U.S. households subscribe to some combination of multi-
channel programming service through cable, telco and satellite
providers. At the 80% mark the cable networks reach, at least from the
perspective of advertisers, a national footprint that is functionally
equivalent to that of the broadcast networks.

-- It has become a truism that digital technologies penetrate faster than
their analog counterparts, in part because global manufacturing and
global adoption have allowed pricing to fall faster. DVD players,
launched only eight years ago, are in 78.5% of households. Cell phones
are in 75.9% and personal computers are in 74.2% of homes-with
virtually all of those connected to the Internet through a combination
of dial-up, cable modems and DSL connections. The most important
subsegment is the one comprised by cable modems and DSL, which offer
high-speed access to the Internet and define the broadband universe.
Some 34.3% of all households now have broadband access-and these homes
are the foundation for the next generation of media and entertainment
launches.

-- The American household is awash in "screens". From TV sets to cell
phones to PDAs to PCs-even portable game and music players-the modern
home is an open portal to outside entertainment and information
providers. Some three-quarters have a PC and a third own two or more.
More than half of all homes have three or more TV sets.

"How people obtain, consume and transport entertainment is in a state of transformation," said Mr. Wing. "While no one knows precisely how these changes will impact content developers and consumers, in a perfect illustration of partnership between Nielsen Entertainment and Nielsen Media Research, we are delivering a comprehensive and empirically-derived report on what we see as the challenges and opportunities of our digital future and how clients could be impacted."

Said Mr. Gerbrandt, "Nielsen Entertainment is an unrivaled provider of consumption data and thought leadership in the entertainment industry. Benchmarking the Digital Household puts both sides to work; stitching a path among components of Actionable Entertainment Intelligence by focusing on the adoption of innovations, the interconnections between behaviors, and the broader impact digitization of content has on the consumption of entertainment."

Added Mr. Wing, "Larry Gerbrandt is the perfect individual to spearhead this effort with experience in all aspects of media analysis and a deep understanding of the entertainment verticals we cover. We are happy to welcome him as part of the Nielsen Entertainment team."

Larry Gerbrandt served as Director of AlixPartners, a financial advisory firm where he specialized in valuation, consulting and litigation support. Prior to AlixPartners, Mr. Gerbrandt was COO/Senior Analyst of Kagan Media, a media market research company where he oversaw all Kagan content, publishing, research, appraisal and consulting operations and played a vital role in building Kagan into one of the leading media and entertainment research firms. Mr. Gerbrandt also held the position of Operations Manager at Orion Cable Systems and was founder and producer at Brimstone Films. Mr. Gerbrandt holds a BA in Business Administration from Regis University.

Other Nielsen Entertainment Reports due in 2005 include the Economics of On-Demand Programming and a series of research studies covering the Motion Picture, Mobile and Video Games entertainment verticals.

Said Mr. Wing, "Nielsen Entertainment is currently the largest source of entertainment measurement information. With a new emphasis on reports, you'll see much of that data come to life in research studies intended to guide some of the thinking and discussion around changes in consumer choice, control, and convenience, and with a great deal of emphasis overall on how people spend their money and time."

Nielsen Entertainment

Through custom research, consulting and the world's most comprehensive network of entertainment measurement systems, Nielsen Entertainment delivers Actionable Entertainment Intelligence to clients engaged in the business of selling entertainment and trading in the marketplace of our popular culture.

Nielsen Entertainment's AEI products give clients unrivaled perspective from which to steer business decisions, providing the measure and the motivation in one package; comparing what the consumer says they do and what they actually do, in any given environment including film, television, music, books, and interactive media.

Nielsen Entertainment is comprised of the following businesses: National Research Group (NRG), EDI and EDI International, Television Services, SoundScan, Broadcast Data Systems (BDS), Music Control, VideoScan, Market Navigator, BookScan, BookData, and Interactive Entertainment, and utilizes the full portfolio of sister companies including Nielsen Media Research (television ratings) and Nielsen Net Ratings (internet usage) to deliver a whole media point of view. Nielsen Entertainment is part of VNU (www.vnu.com), a global leader in information services for the media and entertainment industries.

Benchmarking the Digital Household from Nielsen Entertainment Reports will be available November 16, 2005. The analysis will provide readers a clear understanding of what impact digital entertainment technology has had on the American household of the 21st century. Technologies such as digital cable, DVD players, the PC and broadband connectivity among other will be highlighted as having been profoundly transforming since tipping into the mainstream.

Source: Nielsen Entertainment

CONTACT: Davina Harilela, +1-323-817-1958 for Nielsen Entertainment

Web site: http://www.nielsenmedia.com/
http://www.vnu.com/

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