Startup provides cable and DTH operators with tools to connect to multiple TVs

A Toronto-based startup will soon unveil technology that will allow broadcast-quality digital video to be streamed wirelessly to multiple televisions and other consumer electronics devices without the need for duplicate set-top boxes. ViXS Systems Inc. has developed a chip set that turns the digital cable box into a home gateway that puts multiple televisions, PCs and other devices on the same Internet Protocol (IP) network. If the technology lives up to expectations, it will essentially allow for the delivery of greater digital services for less money. "The primary benefit for the cable operator is they can deploy digital services on multiple devices without going through the cost of putting in multiple set-top boxes and (eliminating) the installation, labour and truck-roll costs," Roy Stewart, senior VP of corporate development at ViXS, tells Canadian Communications Reports. The company appears to have the buy-in of Rogers Cable Inc., with the announcement this week that Alek Krstajic, senior VP of sales, marketing and product development at the cable company, had been appointed to the ViXS board of directors. While ViXS wouldn't confirm that Rogers would be buying set-top boxes integrated with its chip set, the company did say that a deal is hopeful. "(Krstajic) joining the board implies Rogers' commitment to ViXS, but there are no public agreements," ViXS' spokesman Ian Yellin tells CCR. "But we hope to have that by the end of Q4 as well." ViXS' chip set will support both 802.11a and 802.11b wireless protocols in connecting to multiple televisions and consumer electronic devices. The latter wireless standard is growing in popularity as airports, hotels and other public spaces are outfitted for wireless connectivity to the Internet. The problem in the past for delivering broadcast-quality video over IP-based networks has been the inability to get the video signal through the available channel in the network, Stewart notes. He says that the ViXS chip set solves that issue: "The xcode IC (integrated circuit) we've created can actually rate groom the video to fit through whatever available channel there is in the home. We've been able to solve that problem for in-home or local area network distribution." The real value of this technology seems far off though, with digital services only in their infancy. "We think the real sweet spot for our technology is when everything goes digital," Stewart says. "As everything goes digital, we can then take that digital signal coming into the home and redistribute it from one access point to multiple devices." But he points out that the ViXS chip set may also help speed the rollout of digital if cable companies and direct-to-home (DTH) satellite TV distributors can offer customers a solution that will no longer require them to have a digital set-top box for each television. The fact that analog signals, and not digital, can be received on multiple television sets has been a selling point for many cablecos over their DTH rivals. For example, Omineca Cablevision Ltd. in British Columbia has a marketing campaign touting the fact that its analog tiers can be received on multiple television sets in a household (CCR, Jan. 18/02). As well, Star Choice Communications Inc. received many complaints from customers when it began charging $4.99/month for additional receivers in a household (CCR Update, Feb. 20/02; CCR, March 1/02). "Today the challenge is that most content is not digital," Stewart says. "Cable operators have focused on solving quality problems around an analog product and they have not focused on solving quality of service problems around a digital product for in-home distribution. Our technology solves quality of service for digital delivery." ViXS has just emerged from stealth mode and is deliberately being vague on its technology until it officially launches chip set sampling next month. By the end of this year, ViXS anticipates publicly releasing design wins and customer contracts, which will shed more light on the company's strategy for getting its chip set into digital set-top boxes and televisions.

Startup provides cable and DTH operators with tools to connect to multiple TVs

Broadcast | August 29, 2002

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