Plans to Allow AV Certification Company to Continue Operating As an Independent Venture

Audiovisual certification gatekeeper THX has been purchased by high-end gaming hardware and peripherals vendor Razer (Irvine, CA), which says the company will operate as an independent start-up, separate from its parent company.

"As a standalone company, THX will work with Razer but will primarily continue to service our partners in the industry in order to deliver great products to consumers," said THX CEO Ty Ahmad-Taylor in a statement released by Razer. The company's management and employees are being kept in place, Razer said, and will be allowed to enter agreements with other partners in addition to Razer.

Watch an edit of all of the THX theatrical trailers released between 1983 and 2015.

Named after former Lucasfilm sound guru Tomlinson Holman, who developed the original THX standard as a way to ensure high presentation standards for movie theaters showing Return of the Jedi, THX was spun off from Lucasfilm in 2002, when Creative Labs took an interest in the company that eventually grew to majority ownership. (Holman now works for Apple.) In 2013, THX filed a lawsuit against Apple alleging patent infringement related to speaker designs that is still tied up in court in the Northern District of California.

In recent years, THX has pushed its certification program — and the high-end connotations of its brand — into new areas, culminating in this year's launch of THX Live!, a live concert-sound certification program that debuted with Beyoncé's Formation World Tour.