CRITERIA C

The people concerned with the technology and use of IMAX projectors are the creators, the customers, the owners of IMAX (Richard Gelfond) (Knowledgeatwharton.edu, 9 February, 2009) and the owners of the theatres that are to be upgraded. The main stakeholders of the business are MFC Global Investment Management (U.S.), LLC, First Wilshire Securities Management, Inc. and Goldman Sachs Group.

Since IMAX and other 3D projector technology is too expensive, all theatres cannot be upgraded at present. As future predicted results show, IMAX projectors would begin to get cheaper as they become more common around the world – this is called economies of scale (it is when the price of a product or service is decreased due to the increase in production) (investorwords.com, 9 February, 2009). Theatres all around the US would see a slow increase in the use of 3D technology at a cheaper price. More people will begin to trust technology. But, this could also be a disadvantage in many ways. The price to watch such movies will be much higher, and hence unaffordable by some groups in society. While on one side, the spread of such technology will enable more people to gain access to this form of entertainment, on the other hand, it could increase the gap between people and machines due to its high pricing strategies. (An IMAX movie costs about $11 per head, while a regular movie costs between $4.5 and $6) (Sugi, Jon, 23 May, 2007).

One of IMAX’s greatest issues is that it needs specialist in every field e.g.: a special IMAX projector, a special IMAX technician, special IMAX cameras etc. (Rose, Steve, 6 January 2004). Hence, the spread of this kind of technology will result in great amount of redundancies and will require retraining to be done so people can catch be educated about IMAX. This will be extremely expensive for businesses and will use a lot of time.