Jack Roe

How did we get there? Our great grandfather, Jack Roe, started our familys journey all the way back in 1913 when he was working as a cinematographic engineer, operating and maintaining early cinema projectors. In the 1920s, times were hard and many people lost their job, Jack included. He stuck to what he knew, and started working for the film stud... ios on Wardour Street (Film Row) in London there were about 40 of them at the time. Maude, his supportive and very patient wife, allowed him to use the familys kitchen table to do his work. Soon he rented an old hat factory in central London, and the rest, as they say, is history. Weve done everything from importing shipping containers of cinema carbons to reconditioning film spools in the 1950s metal was scarce and new film equipment was hard to source and very expensive. Weve manufactured film splicing tape, invented high-density film spacing and even created a special test film for cutting aperture plates remotely by machine. In the early 1980s, cinemas were on the decline and so we started writing software in 1982. Just a couple of years later the first cinema multiplex was born, and cinema was reborn with it. In the 1990s a brilliant entrepreneur from Northern Ireland and prominent name in the cinema industry, Michael McAdam, suggested that we combine the businesses and create software specifically for cinemas. He had been to Showest (which became Cinemacon in 2011) and insisted that we should be there too. We started going to Vegas every year for the largest cinema convention in the world, and have been there every year since. Were not scared of change. We love it. From the days of the silver screen, digital sound, widescreen, HDR, 3D glasses and everything in between weve embraced the fast-paced nature of our industry with innovations at every opportunity, never losing our passion for our industry or our appetite to improve it. We are a 90-year-old startup. We are Benjamin Button. No matter how many cinemas you have or what problems youre facing, we give you ...Read More