Ray Van Eng (10/16/97)                                        

Intel Corp. will develop a 3-D computer animation technology for the TicketMaster Group Inc. to help them sell more special event tickets in cyberspace by giving online consumers a 3-D video tour of the venue before choosing the best seats for purchase.

To fully appreciate the elaborate video presentation, the online consumer would need to have at least a Pentium II computer and a reasonably fast access pipeline (56Kbps).

The Intel 3-D application will go live in the second quarter of 1998. Currently, TicketMaster generates about $3 million a month from online ticketing.

In the future, the 3-D technology could also be used to greatly enhance the appeal of the TicketMaster web site such as promoting products at the TM Store (they sell Elvis memorabilia there), take a virtual tour of your dream resort before making the travel arrangement at the TicketMaster Travel store etc.

Intel's latest announcement with TicketMaster is just another indication that the chip maker is diversifying from its main business of supplying processors to personal computers.

New areas that Intel are venturing into include speech recognition, web security, content management and filtering technologies.

Interestingly, Intel openly disagrees with Microsoft in the emerging digital cable TV- cum-Internet market in which the Redmond software firm is proposing the use of its Windows CE operating system for set-top boxes that incorporate processors made by manufacturers other than Intel.

Intel also chooses to work with Network Computer Inc., an Oracle and Netscape alliance to establish an open standards platform for set top TV boxes that competes with Microsoft's offering with the WebTV deal.

It would seem that Intel and Microsoft have learned not to put all eggs into one basket and become overly dependent on each other and be locked out of future opportunities as the great media convergence continues to evolve.