NTT develops realtime 4K high frame rate HEVC codec

NTT has developed a real–time 4K high frame rate HEVC codec for the live transmission of high frame rate (HFR) video. The codec doubles the frame rate of the standard video frame rate (SFR), from 50/60p to 100/120p.

NTT has demonstrated a 4K HFR HEVC encoder appliance and a 4K HFR HEVC decoder appliance, both of which are 1U size.

The 4K HFR HEVC encoder appliance provides backward compatibility by supporting temporal–scalable encoding, meaning the output stream can be decoded by conventional SFR decoder to yield 4K SFR video.

Moreover, our codec supports the MPEG Media Transport (MMT) protocol which enables hierarchical transmission. Two independent transmission routes can be used to transfer the base–layer data, which is used for decoding of 4K SFR video, and the enhancement–layer data, which is used together with base–layer data for decoding 4K HFR video.

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Facebook Acquires Quickfire Networks for Video

Facebook has acquired QuickFire Networks, a start-up based in San Diego that specializes in video encoding technologies. Financial terms were not disclosed.

QuickFire developed a 1-RU, Intel-based appliance for processing and transcoding video.

Facebook noted that it now has over one billion video views on average every day.

http://www.quickfirenetworks.com/
http://www.facebook.com

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Freescale Acquires Zenverge for 4K Transcoding

Freescale Semiconductor has acquired Zenverge, a leading developer of advanced HD content processing ICs. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Zenverge’s transcoding technology enables the conversion of one media stream into multiple streams, each individually formatted and optimized for the specific internet connected device or platform where it will be displayed. Among the supported formats planned is the Ultra HD (HEVC) standard, which features outstanding 4K resolution while delivering up to 50 percent bandwidth savings due to highly advanced data compression. As part of the agreement, key members of Zenverge have joined Freescale. Zenverge is based in Santa Clara, California.

Freescale said the acquisition will significantly enhance its content processing, storage and interoperability capabilities for a range of Video Internet of Things applications and markets.

“This acquisition extends Freescale’s reach into both display- and media-centric processing at a time when both the volume and density of internet content is growing rapidly,” said Lees. “Zenverge is a recognized leader in the secure optimization, unification, storage and distribution of rich digital content. The company’s highly advanced technologies present growth opportunities for Freescale in new markets, while providing compelling and highly differentiated functionality for future generations of many popular Freescale product portfolios.”

http://www.freescale.com
http://www.zenverge.com/

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ARRIS Acquires SeaWell for ABR Streaming Technology

ARRIS has acquired SeaWell Networks, a developer of adaptive bit rate (ABR) streaming technologies.  Financial terms were not disclosed.

SeaWell is based in Mississauga, Ontario.  ARRIS plans to integrated SeaWell's streaming technologies into its Network & Cloud business. This combined portfolio – of IP video, multiscreen, and ad insertion solutions – will be the enabler for next-gen TV and advertising services.

"This acquisition further positions ARRIS to transform IP video delivery…from content creation to consumption," said Bob Stanzione, ARRIS Chairman and CEO. "ARRIS and SeaWell Networks recently collaborated, introducing an integrated solution to monetize the multiscreen opportunity. SeaWell's technology and talent impressed our team, and we are excited to do more together. Combining our solutions, technologists and roadmaps promises to accelerate the delivery of the personalized TV and advertising solutions that service providers need and their consumers crave."

Brian Collie, SeaWell Networks Founder and CEO said, "This acquisition will create new opportunities for our employees, customers and the industry. This combination will provide the next-gen TV solutions our customers need to more quickly and cost-effectively transition to IP and multiscreen video."

http://www.arrisi.com

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Ericsson Intros High Density Stream Processing Platform

Ericsson introduced a new video processing platform for TV service providers.

The Ericsson AVP 1000 Stream Processor, which is described as the most dense and powerful stream processor of its kind, is a 2RU that can process up to 512 transport streams of up to 300 Mbps each. It includes 10GigE interfaces, six high capacity option slots, dual high-capacity power supplies and new front to rear cooling with twin independent airflows for maximum cooling efficiency. Content security is assured through the scrambling of eight separate CAs (conditional access).

Dr. Giles Wilson, Head of TV Compression, Ericsson said: "Managing stream processing in increasingly video-centric network infrastructures can be complex and problematic. The AVP 1000 Stream Processor has been designed to take the pain out of this process by delivering enough power and density while keeping operational costs to a minimum. With over two decades of experience in the compression space, we understand that our customers need solutions which offer the perfect combination of performance quality, cost effectiveness, and investment value and our new stream processing platform does just that."

http://www.ericsson.com

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Ericsson Launches Software-based Virtualized Encoding Solution

Ericsson introduced a software-based Virtualized Encoding solution designed to remove the complexity of TV Anywhere video processing.

Ericsson Virtualized Encoding supports all input-types (compressed off-air or mezzanine and uncompressed), all output-types (traditional linear broadcast on cable, IPTV, DTH satellite and DTT, Multiscreen ABR delivery over IP) and all codecs (MPEG-2, MPEG-4 AVC and HEVC). It can be implemented on processing platforms containing a combination of dedicated programmable hardware such as Ericsson's video processing chip, in customer premises and software or GPU-based servers on premise, or potentially deployed in the cloud.

Ericsson said it developed the new solution to be completely task and service-oriented, intelligently allocating resources and simplifying the process of selecting the right encoding method and platform based on the operator's priorities for deployment speed, video quality and output.

Dr. Giles Wilson, Head of TV Compression, Ericsson says: "In today's TV Anywhere world there is no 'one-size fits all' solution to video processing and a variety of compression platforms are being used to balance investment, architecture and performance. With the launch of Ericsson Virtualized Encoding we are unifying all these processing platforms under one intelligent software abstraction layer to ensure best-in-class performance, simplification of processes, reduced operational burden and far greater agility in deploying services. Our customers are especially welcoming our approach in removing the burden of deploying HEVC compression, and the inevitable platform upgrades as performance demands increase rapidly."

http://www.ericsson.com

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Licensing Terms Announced for HEVC (aka H.265 and MPEG-H Part 2)

A group of 25 companies have agreed on license terms for the High Efficiency Video Coding (also known as H.265 and MPEG-H Part 2).

HEVC is designed to improve video coding efficiency for the benefit of Internet and mobile service providers.  It is also expected to deliver next generation higher resolution HDTV video displays for 4K and 8K Ultra High Definition TV (UHDTV).

Some key elements of the HEVC Patent Portfolio License, which is expected in early 2014:

Decoder-Encoder Manufacturer Sublicenses

• HEVC products sold by a legal entity to end users
• 0 – 100,000 units/year = no royalty (available to one legal entity in an affiliated group)
• US $0.20 per unit after first 100,000 units each year
• Maximum annual royalty payable by an enterprise (company and greater than 50% owned subsidiaries): initially starts at $25M
• Includes right to make, use and sell
• Royalties are payable for HEVC products from May 1, 2013 forward

“As contemplated, the HEVC license will utilize a modern streamlined pool licensing approach with simple easy-to-understand terms making the technology readily accessible to the largest possible market in the shortest possible time,” said MPEG LA President and CEO Larry Horn. “MPEG LA salutes the cooperation of patent owners who have worked hard to reach common ground in making a joint patent license available for the convenience of HEVC adopters. As a result of their efforts, consumers benefiting from a marketplace of competitive technology choices will be the clear winners.”

As work continues on evaluating patents for essentiality and concluding terms in final agreements, the license is currently supported by 25 prospective HEVC essential patent holders including the following:

• Apple Inc.
• British Broadcasting Corporation
• Cisco Technology, Inc.
• Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI) of Korea
• Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft zur Foerderung der angewandten Forschung e.V.
• Hitachi Maxell, Ltd.
• HUMAX Co., Ltd.
• JVC KENWOOD Corporation
• KT Corp.
• LG Electronics Inc.
• M&K Holdings Inc.
• NEC Corporation
• Nippon Hoso Kyokai
• Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation
• NTT DOCOMO, INC.
• Orange SA
• Siemens AG
• SK Telecom
• Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson
• Thomson Licensing
• Vidyo, Inc.

http://www.mpegla.com/main/Pages/Media.aspx

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Harris Broadcast Completes Acquisition of Imagine Communications

Harris Broadcast completed its previously announced acquisition of Imagine Communications, a supplier of digital video solutions for content providers and system operators, for an undisclosed sum.

Harris Broadcast said the acquisition enhances its solutions portfolio as its builds the first true "MultiService SDN", integrating sales, scheduling, automation, playout and delivery throughout both linear and non-linear content distribution networks. It also brings advanced transcoding technology utilizing cutting edge software breakthroughs that run in high density, low power commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) and blade-server environments, consistent with Harris Broadcast’s vision of software-centric, virtualized operations.

Imagine Communications supplies TV Everywhere transcoding that utilizes software running in a virtualized blade server environment.  The solution combines video processing, Adaptive Bit Rate (ABR) transcoding and statistical multiplexing technology tp provide the bandwidth efficiency and density needed to meet the demand for TV Everywhere services.

“TV Everywhere is the future of our industry, and our customers are vigorously pursuing this path to expand their business models and improve the monetization of content across any screen,” said Charlie Vogt, CEO of Harris Broadcast. “The advanced Adaptive Bit Rate (ABR) technology created by Imagine combines quality, density and a small footprint to greatly leapfrog anything else on the market today and improves transcoding economics up to a factor of 10 over competing alternatives. Our content creator and content distribution customers, including cable, MSO and telecommunications service providers, will benefit significantly from end-to-end portfolio integration that establishes a clear pathway to linear and non-linear viewing parity across every screen.”

http://www.harrisbroadcast.com
http://www.imaginecommunications.com

• Imagine Communications was founded in 2005 and is based in San Diego.
• In Dec. 2012, Harris agreed to sell its Broadcast Communications business to an affiliate of The Gores Group $225 million.

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NTT Advanced Technology Intros H.265/HEVC Kit

NTT Advanced Technology introduced an H.265/HEVC codec software development kit (SDK) for applications ranging from mobile video to 4K video.

H.265/HEVC, also known as 'High Efficiency Video Coding' (HEVC), was approved by the ITU-T's Study Group 16 in April 2013.

NTT said H.265/HEVC provides approximately twice the compression performance when compared with conventional H.264/AVC.

Some key features of the SDK:

• HEVC elementary stream I/O (Annex.B form)
• CBR rate control / VBR rate control
• Automatic scene change detection and key-frame insert specification
• Frame reference structure specification
• Pre-filter control
• Progressive / interlace structural compatibility
• Parallel encoding by slice structure and LCU pipeline
• Adaptive-quantization matrix
• DeBlocking Filter/SAO Filter Control

http://www.ntt-at.com/product/rfs_hevc_sdk/

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TI implements H.265 on KeyStone multicore DSPs

Texas Instruments is offering a pre-production H.265 video codec optimized for its TMS320C6678 KeyStone-based multicore digital signal processor (DSP).

H.265, which is designed to take advantage of parallel processing, uses up to 50 percent less bandwidth, or two times compression, over the current H.264 standard while providing the same video quality.  The TI chip provides eight 1.25 GHz DSP cores capable of delivering 320 GMACs and 160 GFLOPs of combined fixed- and floating-point performance.

TI said its software-based implementation of the H.265 standard provides flexibility and scalability in developing real-time video infrastructure equipment such as multimedia gateways, IMS media servers, video conferencing servers and video broadcast equipment.

http://www.ti.com

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Google Gains MPEG LA License for Techniques in VP8

Google and MPEG LA reached a deal granting Google a license to techniques that may be essential to VP8 and earlier generation VPx video compression technologies under patents owned by 11 patent holders.

The agreements also grant Google the right to sublicense those techniques to any user of VP8, whether the VP8 implementation is by Google or another entity. It further provides for sublicensing those VP8 techniques in one next-generation VPx video codec.

MPEG LA said it now will discontinue its effort to form a VP8 patent pool.

http://www.mpegla.com/main/Pages/Media.aspx

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At The Cable Show this week in Boston, Motorola Mobility is showcasing its latest innovations for cable operators offering whole home connectivity, including its DCX3600 Video Gateway – a nextgen set-top positioned as the entertainment hub in the living room... and morphing into the Center of the IP Connected Home.

Motorola Mobility is also demonstrating HEVC video compression technology, which reduces bandwidth by 50 percent in comparison to MPEG4 AVC/H.264 at similar video quality. HEVC was jointly developed by ISO/IEC Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG) and ITU-T Video Coding Experts Group (VCEG). It promises better video delivery over wireless link, including Wi-Fi and cellular.

Time Warner Cable has selected the company's SecureMedia Encryptonite ONE HLS+ solution for securing video streams across a variety of devices – including smartphones, tablets, game consoles, connected TVs and Blu-Ray players.

http://motorola.com

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Motorola Mobility Showcases Home Connectivity Vision, HEVC

At The Cable Show this week in Boston, Motorola Mobility is showcasing its latest innovations for cable operators offering whole home connectivity, including its DCX3600 Video Gateway – a nextgen set-top positioned as the entertainment hub in the living room... and morphing into the Center of the IP Connected Home.

Motorola Mobility is also demonstrating HEVC video compression technology, which reduces bandwidth by 50 percent in comparison to MPEG4 AVC/H.264 at similar video quality. HEVC was jointly developed by ISO/IEC Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG) and ITU-T Video Coding Experts Group (VCEG). It promises better video delivery over wireless link, including Wi-Fi and cellular.

Time Warner Cable has selected the company's SecureMedia Encryptonite ONE HLS+ solution for securing video streams across a variety of devices – including smartphones, tablets, game consoles, connected TVs and Blu-Ray players.
http://motorola.com 

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Sisvel Acquires Over 450 Nokia Patents

Sisvel International, which already manage patent pools for the UHF-RFID, CDMA 2000, DVB-T, and DVB-T2 standards, announced that it has acquired 47 patent families comprised of more than 450 patents and applications originally filed by Nokia. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Sisvel noted that thirty-three of the patent families, consisting of more than 350 patents and applications, have been declared essential by Nokia to second, third and fourth-generation communications standards, including GSM, UMTS/WCDMA (Universal Mobile Telecommunications Service / Wide-Band Code Division Multiple Access) and LTE. The balance of the portfolio consists of implementation patents including video encoding optimization technologies. The acquired patents remain subject to certain prior agreements and Nokia is licensed under the portfolio as part of the acquisition.

"Sisvel has been extremely active in recent years working with the wireless industry to provide simplified access to essential wireless patents on fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory, or FRAND, conditions," said Giustino de Sanctis, CEO of Sisvel International. Mr. de Sanctis also explained that "Acquiring the many essential patents in this key portfolio is a very significant step for Sisvel and a testament to Sisvel's commitment and determination to succeed in this space. We look forward to offering these essential patents on FRAND terms and to continuing our work within the wireless industry."
http://www.sisvel.com

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