MUMBAI: Mukta-Adlabs Digital Exhibition, the joint venture between Adlabs Films and Subhash Ghai's Mukta Arts, has earmarked Rs. 40 million to replace its existing digital projectors with new Panasonic projectors. Mukta-Adlabs is involved in setting up digital cinemas and distributing digital film prints across the country.

This is in addition to the Rs. 100 million the company has already invested in the digitisation project.

Adlabs Films CEO Dr. Sunil Patil says technical failure of the existing system has forced the company to replace it with new Panasoinic 3-chip projector system in all its 74 digital cinemas across India. He has termed the technical fault as 'lamp burn'.

"The projector which we had been using did not live up to the expectations. It could not deliver the quality that we expected from it. Another reason behind the replacement is the huge running cost for these projectors. We have decided to replace the present projector system with a much stable, slightly expensive Panasonic 3-chip projector. And we hope that these projectors will give us the print like quality. So right now we are at a stage of consolidation, we are replacing our existing equipments with a much better one," offers Patil.

According to Patil, Mukta-Adlabs had a total of 90 digital installations. "We had to discontinue some because of the projector problems," he offered.

Patil said the first phase of the alteration process would start with 38 theatres in Maharashtra. Mukta-Adlabs has its digital screen presence in states Maharashtra, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and West Bengal.