RealD will equip up to 200 Karo Film cinema screens and up to 100 Kinomax screens across Russia with RealD 3D technology.
 
“Having recently opened an office in Moscow, Russia is an increasingly important market for RealD and one we have targeted with ambitious plans for long-term growth,” said Michael V. Lewis, chairman and CEO of RealD.
 
Karo Film recently announced a strategic investment by a consortium backing the Moscow-based media entrepreneur Paul Heth. The consortium acquired a controlling interest in the company and committed to an additional investment of approximately $100 million to open new multiplex cinema venues under the Karo brand over the next three years. Karo Film currently operates 31 modern movie theatres comprising of 197 screens in Moscow, the Moscow region, St. Petersburg, Nizhniy Novgorod, Samara, Kazan, Kaliningrad and Surgut.

Kinomax, meanwhile, “has installed the first 9 RealD 3D systems in Rostov, Volzhskiy and Krasnodar and plans to complete the installation of the remaining 91 systems by the end of calendar year 2013,” said Dmitry Nartov, general director. Kinomax currently operates more than 28 cinema locations with 149 auditoriums in more than 20 cities across Russia.

Russia has grown to become one of the world’s leading cinema markets, with box office estimated to total approximately $1.3 billion (40.5 billion rubles) in 2012, a 15 percent increase from 2011, according to Romir Movie Research. Similarly, 3D cinema ticket sales in the region continue to grow, increasing by more than 200% between June 2010 and June 2012, according to IHS Screen Digest.