I can't imagine this would knock BRCM, so it must have been more profit taking than anything else (the following news is pretty lame):
Friday March 24 4:39 PM ET
IBM Develops Chips for TV Set-Top Boxes
By Barbara Etzel
NEW YORK (Reuters) - International Business Machines Corp. (NYSE:IBM - news), said on Friday it is developing a next-generation system-on-a-chip for television set-top boxes aimed at bringing the power of the Internet into the living room.
Demand for digital set-top boxes, which enable Internet access, wider entertainment choices and even the ability to make telephone calls, is expected to more than double by 2003, pitting chip companies and set-top box providers against each other to stake their claim in the fast-growing market.
IBM said it is combining high-speed PowerPC processors and other television set-top box components onto a single 'system-on-a-chip' that is over four times faster than its current product offerings, which will enable Internet access.
The three new systems-on-a chip simplify the set-top box design by combining components such as an audio/video decoder, memory interface and peripheral interfaces all on one chip, the company said.
Shares of IBM were up 5 1/16 at 120 in trade on the New York Stock Exchange.
``The Internet is really going to be driving a lot of these new applications, which are going to be on new platforms such as set-top boxes,' John Sixsmith, marketing manager for digital video products group at IBM's Microelectronics Division in East Fishkill, N.Y. Using digital set-top boxes,
television viewers will be able to access the Internet through their TV, in order to shop, obtain stock quotes or gather other information online.
Movie fans will be able to use set-top boxes to search for particular programming and to stop live broadcasts on-screen temporarily, without missing anything.
``The passive, one-way TV in your living room is being transformed into a gateway for rich, interactive content,' Paul Belluz, director of digital video products at IBM's Microelectronics Division, said.
So far, the adoption of set-top boxes has been moderately paced, but demand is picking up, Sixsmith said. The real growth in the market is expected to occur in 2001 and 2002.
According to technology research firm Dataquest, a division on Gartner Group Inc. (NYSE:IT - news), the worldwide production of digital set-top boxes is expected to more than double by 2003 to 47.8 million units from 20 million units in 1999.
For its earlier generation chip product, IBM has shipped 3 million chip-sets units during the three last years.
In the set-top boxes STMicroelectronics (NYSE:STM - news)(STM.PA) had 31.6 percent of the market share in 1998, ahead of No. 2 LSI Logic Corp. (NYSE:LSI -
news) with 16.7 percent of the market, according to Dataquest.
IBM said it plans to have its mid- and high-range PowerPC 405 system-on-a-chip available in May, with the low-end Power PC 401 available in the second half of the
year. |
