Intertainment Media Corporate Update

2012-10-30 08:45 ET - News Release

TORONTO, CANADA -- (MARKET WIRE) -- 10/30/12

Intertainment Media Inc. ("Intertainment" or the "Company") (TSX VENTURE:INT)(OTCQX:ITMTF)(FRANKFURT:I4T) is pleased to provide a corporate update to accompany its Financial Statements and Management Discuss & Analysis for the Year Ended June 30, 2012 which can be found at www.sedar.com.

The 2012 fiscal year for Intertainment Media was one that showed great strides forward as the Company's efforts were squarely focused on developing and investing in our proprietary platforms and those of our portfolio companies with a distinct focus to ensure we develop businesses that can achieve scale and value for our shareholders. As the Company moves through 2013, the focus of the Company has shifted from early start up to commercialization and revenue activities have become the primary focus of the operating divisions.

Ortsbo was the prime recipient of the investment and cash usage in 2012 as the Company purchased the underlying assets to the Ortsbo platform and invested heavily in developing commercial core applications for the Customer Care, Corporate Communications and Social Media arenas. According to TheNextWeb, today, almost 75% of Internet users do not speak English as their primary language and the estimated value of the online communications industry is approaching $42 Trillion dollars globally according to the Common Sense Advisory. The Company believes and has proven to a number of major clients that Ortsbo has a "game changing" technology allowing it to be one of the first movers in the real-time language space allowing people, regardless of their native language to speak across commercial lines of business in real-time.

With changes to the Federal Communications Commission rules is early 2012 with respect to accessibility, the captioning market is estimated to grow from $4B in 2009 to $10B in 2015. The FCC has mandated that beginning this year, live and near-live programming on television must be captioned with additional Internet streams requiring closed captioning through 2015. Ortsbo has patents filed with the US patent office for multiple language closed captioning technology.

The Company's itiBiti and Ad Taffy divisions continued on their growth trajectory over Fiscal 2012 with significant gains in users and new clients. The KNCTR platform now counts over 4 million unique user installations in North America and is poised to capture a portion of the overall digital media ad spend in 2013. Zenith Optimedia estimates that digital advertising spending in North America will grow 15.1% in 2013 and exceed $100 Billion dollars globally.

The Company's other division, Magnum Fine Commercial Printing, has accelerated programs with major Canadian and international brands, developing new products and programs in several major verticals including the legal services market. Growth opportunities for Magnum are focused on increased revenues through the introduction of new technology offerings and business acquisitions.

Intertainment Media is also developing exciting new platforms that take advantage of its core competencies in social media applications. A recent initiative is the Sweet Card program, combining consumer loyalty offerings for major artists and specialty brands in a prepaid debit card and virtual wallet platform. According to the Aite Group, the prepaid debit card market is expected to be $120B by year-end 2012. The Sweet Card program includes a mobile wallet feature designed to leverage the mobile spending market. This market is expected to reach $1 trillion in 3 years and will be an area of focus for the Company and is expected to attract a large number of users and partners interested in the technology and affinity platforms.

During 2012, the Company purchased the balance of Ortsbo for CDN $24.5 Million, a critical investment to enable the Intertainment to fully realize a potential spin out value for the asset and to generate additional capital for the Company to continue on our growth strategy. The management costs of the entire Intertainment group and the associated operating expenses amounted to approximately CDN $3 Million and the Company spent approximately CDN $5.1 Million in cash to purchase interests in its portfolio companies in 2012. Intertainment remains committed to using the majority of funds generated and raised to focus on building operating divisional programs which will create substantial asset value for our shareholders. Although accounting rules dictate that expenses related to the building of market value of a technology asset are treated as expenditures, which may ultimately create higher losses, the Company feels that these expenditures have built significant market value and have increased business opportunities that will lead to future business and potentially realized value of the assets through positive cash flow, earnings and divestiture opportunities.

On the capital market side, the Company continues to work with counsel both in Canada and the US as well as US based investment banking firms. Management has presented a plan to the Intertainment Board of Directors and has received approval to pursue US capital strategies for Intertainment Media Inc. as well as the follow along anticipated spin-outs of divisional companies. The Company will update the market as more information becomes available.

"Intertainment made considerable investments and saw significant social media growth in 2012 and we proved that we can partner and execute with leading industry brands," said David Lucatch, CEO "Although it takes time to make the transition from development to sales, our focus for 2013 is to leverage those investments, growth and relationships into sustainable revenue activities."

Some of the key events that took place during our fiscal 2012 are as follows:

On July 5, 2011, the Company announced the appointment of Anthony Pearlman as President and Chief Operating Officer of Intertainment Media Inc.

On July 7, 2011, the Company announced that it had completed the previously announced arm's length strategic transaction with Commobility Inc. to provide enhanced technology and revenue capabilities.

On October 19, 2011 the Company announced it had completed the acquisition of SaaS Technologies Inc. making its subsidiary, Ortsbo Inc., the sole owner of all existing, in development and future technology, IP and patents related to the Ortsbo platform. Total purchase price was $24,500,000 to be paid by way of cash and common shares of the Company over a period of 24 months.

On November 29, 2011, the Company announced its investment in Active ImageNation Inc., developer of Cap That(TM) patent pending video capture technology for print on demand and social sharing.

On December 8, 2011, the Company announced that it has appointed Patrick Bultema as President of its social media, real time, translation platform, Ortsbo Inc.

On January 5, 2012, the Company announced that its social media, real time, experiential communications platform, Ortsbo Inc. has formed a Strategic Relationship with Variety, the world's leading publication for business entertainment news.

On January 26, 2012, the Company announced that it had made an investment in Los Angeles, CA and London, UK based theAudience, Inc.

On February 1, 2012, the Company announced it had finalized its early stage investment in Shiny Ads which specializes in the sell-side automation of premium inventory for online publishers.

On February 14, 2012, the Company announced that its subsidiary, Ortsbo Inc. together with Variety Magazine unofficially smashed Ortsbo's Guinness World Record established May 2011 with its live coverage of the 2012 Orange British Academy Film Awards (BAFTA) with 161 countries viewing the event. The Company also announced that Ortsbo has filed for US patent on its real time closed captioning language translation system.

On March 1, 2012 the Company announced that it had completed its USD $2MM investment in Active ImageNation Inc., the developer of Cap That(TM), the patent pending video capture technology for print on demand and social media sharing.

On April 10, 2012 the Company announced a 20% ownership investment in Tunezy, Inc., a startup company featuring a disruptive social platform for the recorded music industry.

On April 27, 2012 the Company announced that it had completed its purchase of 25% ownership stake in Israel-based Lexifone Communication Systems (2010) Ltd., a mobile voice translation company.

On May 23, 2012 the Company provided an update on the Ortsbo Spin Out. The Company has received interest from US investment banking firms for both INT & Ortsbo to list on senior US exchanges which the Company will continue to investigate. Other updates include Ortsbo monthly unique users growing to 162 million with the platform moving towards sustainable revenue in several areas.

On June 11, 2012, the Company announced that together with financial services industry partners, it has developed a customized social media financial services program for celebrities and specialty brands called the "the Sweet Card".

On June 19, 2012, the Company announced that its world leading real time global communications experiential platform, Ortsbo has begun operations to provide enhance commercial offerings of customizable global language preferences and marketing services for eCommerce platforms.

On July 6, 2012, the Company announced that its world leading real time global communications experiential platform, Ortsbo had reached a new global milestone with over 213 million unique monthly users recorded for the month of June.

About Intertainment - www.intertainmentmedia.com

Intertainment is one of Canada's leading technology incubators and is focused on developing, nurturing and investing in both North American and global technologies and companies that provide technology solutions for brands and consumers alike. Intertainment also owns and operates a number of key properties including Ad Taffy, itiBiti (KNCTR), Ortsbo, Deal Frenzy, The Sweet Card and Magnum, with investments in leading edge technologies and social media platforms including theaudience.com. For more information on Intertainment and its properties, please visit www.intertainmentmedia.com.

Intertainment is headquartered in the Toronto, Canada region, with offices in New York, Los Angeles and San Mateo, CA and is listed on the TSX Venture Exchange under the symbol "INT" (TSX VENTURE:INT) and in the US on the OTCQX Market under the symbol "ITMTF". Intertainment is also traded in Europe on the unofficial market of the Frankfurt Exchange through the XETRA trading platform under the symbol "I4T".