Corbis, the digital media company owned by Bill Gates that licenses the intellectual property rights to photographs, music and public personalities, is expanding again by acquiring the NMA Group in Los Angeles, a pioneer in the realm of branded entertainment, which helps marketers weave products into the plots of movies and television shows.

Clients of NMA, also known as Norm Marshall Associates, include General Motors, Heineken, Puma, the SodaStream soda maker and the Xbox unit of Microsoft. The acquisition is to be announced on Monday.

“This will greatly expand our ability to offer advertisers ways to more closely affiliate with branded entertainment,” said Gary Shenk, chief executive at Corbis in Seattle.

NMA, which also has offices in New York and London, will operate as an autonomous unit of the entertainment division of Corbis. Mark Owens, president at NMA, will lead the division, which also includes GreenLight, the Corbis licensing consultancy that represents deceased public figures like Einstein, Steve McQueen, and, beginning this month, Martin Luther King Jr.

Norm Marshall, who founded NMA in 1979, will remain chief executive. He said he has been approached “seven or eight times” to sell his firm, “but nothing felt good” until the Corbis offer. What made Corbis more appealing than the other suitors was that it is independent, he added, and operates globally.

Mr. Marshall and Mr. Shenk said they could not discuss the financial terms of the deal. “Bill has a thing about not divulging financial stuff,” Mr. Marshall said, referring to Mr. Gates, adding that Mr. Shenk had told him, “ ‘Norm, if I do it, Bill will fire me.’ ”

In July, Corbis acquired — also for undisclosed financial terms — Splash News, which specializes in providing celebrity photographs to entertainment media like People magazine and TMZ. The Splash images are meant to supplement the Corbis mainstay of stock photography and art images.

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