Nine Systems Selected As Exclusive Media Provider for The BritishOpen Championship

July 16, 2004 - (HostReview.com) - U.S.-based Nine Systems has been selected again as the exclusive streaming provider for this year's Open Championship held this year at Royal Troon Golf Club to deliver streaming audio and video from the official tournament website. Fresh from last year when American Ben Curtis was unexpectedly "the last man standing" at the prestigious golf championship, Nine Systems is again crossing the pond to team with TWIinteractive, producers and hosts of the site as the Internet partner of The Royal & Ancient Golf Club (R&A), organizers of The Open Championship.

"The Open Championship continues to grow in popularity as the global website traffic to last year's event attests," said Angus Farquhar, Commercial Director for The R&A. "We are dedicated to making sure golf fans worldwide can access this prestigious event online with help from the dependable, cutting edge technologies of Nine Systems Stream OS and TWIinteractive."

The streaming of golf's top players in action, including Curtis, last year's champion and Tiger Woods and Vijay Singh, will be delivered daily to desktops of golf fans worldwide via Nine System's streaming media management and distribution platform, Stream OS. The streamed content will include video of each day's highlights, player interviews and streaming radio of course action as it happens at the 133rd annual tournament, which revisits the historic Royal Troon Golf Club on July 15-18, 2004.

Nine Systems helps companies market, monetize and deliver their digital media. With the Stream OS application suite, companies can publish video and other digital media easily, reliably and securely without a large technology investment. With Management OS, companies can turn consumers of digital media into paying customers with our suite of powerful billing and reporting applications.

John Watson, Vice-President of TWIi Hosting said, "Following last year's tournament, we knew that the Stream OS platform could deliver reliable, high-quality streams to a large number of simultaneous users - which is our priority because it means a better experience for all the fans who want to watch or listen to the event online. But Stream OS's media management tools also made our job hosting the event online a lot easier."

Along with The Open Championship, Nine Systems has managed and hosted the daily live streaming of the Wimbledon Championships, the NHL Stanley Cup and other prestigious sporting events through its Stream OS platform. Stream OS is a powerful web-based toolset that makes it easy for companies to manage and deliver streaming and downloadable media on the Web and have it delivered through one of the largest worldwide footprints available today.

The R&A is golf's world governance and development body and organizer of The Open Championship, operating with the consent of 125 national and international amateur and professional organizations from 109 countries and on behalf of an estimated 26 million golfers in Europe, Africa, Asia and the Americas. TWIi is the interactive media and technology arm of IMG, the world's premier sports management agency. TWIi has been pioneering innovations in interactive media since 1996 and has established a worldwide leadership position in digital sports & entertainment. In addition to The Open Championship, TWIi is managing integrated media initiatives for over 35 premier brands including the New England Patriots and Manchester United.