NEW YORK - "Sex is a very powerful thing."

As a guy who has spent much of his life around the porn industry, Steven Hirsch, the 43-year-old head of the adult film studio Vivid Entertainment, has no doubt uttered similar statements countless times before. Yet still, he speaks passionately about his closely held company, its growth prospects and the potential for an initial public offering in the coming months. "With all of the new technologies and the excitement surrounding them," Hirsch says, "this is the right time for us."

As one of adult entertainment's largest film studios, Vivid already generates an estimated $100 million a year in revenue, cranking out 60 films per year and selling them in video stores, hotel rooms, on cable systems and on the Internet. The company sells Vivid-branded merchandise, such as condoms, snowboards, apparel and sexually explicit comic books. And through a licensing deal with Ark Restaurants, the company just opened its first night club, Vivid, inside The Venetian hotel and casino in Las Vegas.