InterTrust purchased the Xaudio MP3 audio technology and the licensing of the MPEG-1 video software playback and streaming technology for an undisclosed amount.

InterTrust said it acquired these assets to accelerate the music industry time to market for DRM-enabled commerce products.

MpegTV's Xaudio MP3 technology is a licensed software playback engine for MP3 audio on the Internet. Industry leaders such as MusicMatch, Diamond RIO, Empeg, and MacAMP already license the Xaudio MP3 technology. The Xaudio technology includes a playback engine that decodes MP3 audio streams, and can support additional codecs such as AAC.

In addition, Gilles Boccon-Gibod, co-founder of MpegTV LLC and the principal developer of the Xaudio technology, has joined InterTrust as director of Multimedia Technology Initiatives and will assume responsibility for actively maintaining the Xaudio technology and integrating it with InterTrust's DRM technology.

"The acquisition of MpegTV's Xaudio MP3 technology enables InterTrust as a commerce platform provider to offer a comprehensive set of the necessary components for doing DRM enabled music over the Internet," said Talal Shamoon, vice president of Corporate Development Technology Initiatives. "The InterTrust platform can now more directly support a wide range of music codecs, software players, platforms and business models of the music industry worldwide."