Billy here's a copy.................
I think we've seen this.
C-CUBE MAKES INITIAL CLAIM TO SINGLE-CHIP MPEG-2 CODEC MARKET: COMPETITION EXPECTED FROM JAPANESE COMPANIES AND IBM
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08/25/97
Multimedia Week
(c) 1997 Phillips Business Information, Inc.
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Whether C-Cube Microsystems Inc.'s [CUBE] head start in developing a single- chip,real-time MPEG-2 codec turns into a business advantage will depend on how quickly a consumer market for the technology develops. C-Cube was expected to announce the first single-chip MPEG-2 codec on Sept. 25. Sample chips are available now, and volume quantities are expected to ship in the fourth quarter. The company expects to have a codec reference design available for OEMs building DVD-RAM drives into PCs in the first half of 1998.
If MPEG-2 becomes the de facto video standard for PCs and DVD- Video recorders before competitors develop single-chip solutions, C- Cube will have a tremendous opportunity to take the lead in this component category. In addition to being first to market, the company's product will offer more than a 50 percent savings over its seven-chip encoder, which sells for about $5,000.
Analysts who spoke with Multimedia Week agreed C-Cube has a technological advantage in the short term but said several Japanese companies and IBM Corp. [IBM] pose a long-term threat to C-Cube in this product category.
Mark Gaare, an analyst with Semico Research, said other likely MPEG-2 challengers will be LSI Logic Inc.[LSI], which has a great deal of R&D into MPEG-2 encoding but hasn't made a chip yet, Toshiba Corp., Sony Corp. and maybe Hitachi Ltd.
"Other people will come on that will be more capable of volume," he said. Matt Gable, CEO of equity research firm MPEG Associates International Inc., expects the MPEG-2 codec market to be a "blood bath" once consumer applications demanding the technology reach mass market levels.
He said C-Cube made a successful business out of VideoCD because "they had the right technology at the right time" but believes the company will have a tougher time making a go of MPEG-2 because more than 10 chip suppliers might get into the market.
Mary Ellen Randall, product manager for digital video products with IBM's microelectronics group, acknowledged that her company is working on a single chip product but wouldn't indicate when it will ship. Analysts expect the IBM codec to hit the market in 1998.
Pointing out that IBM developed the first single-chip encoder on the market and put full-motion video on the Thinkpad notebook in September 1995, Randall said, "You can expect us to continue with strong leadership."
C-Cube's Roadmap
To build demand, C-Cube plans to start at the high end. The company will target broadcast and post-production equipment manufacturers first and then focus on multimedia authoring and the prosumer market in 1998.
Designed for broadcast equipment manufacturers, the DVxpert 6210 supports 4:2:2, offers lossless compression and is targeted at equipment designed for multi-generational encode and decodes as well as studio-to-studio transfers. The component sells for $2,500 and is a two-chip product that will sell as a single-chip component in early 1998. The DVxpert 5110, which supports 4:2:0, is in single-chip form now and will sell for $1,500.
C-Cube hopes consumer-market applications for the technology will take off by 1999. The company's long term-goal is to make MPEG-2 the de facto video standard in camcorders, PCs and DVD-RAM and position the compression scheme as the technology that will let different devices communicate with each other.
C-Cube's business plan is to reach economies of scale for the chip quickly by building all future products on a base architecture called DVx. C-Cube engineers can build varieties of firmware on top of the core technology and address the needs of different markets without having to build new chips from scratch.
On the consumer side, C-Cube anticipates the market for DVD-RAM set-top players to reach greater unit volume than the PC market. However, the company is targeting the PC market first for fear that copy-protection concerns will prevent the technology from becoming a VCR replacement quickly.
Given the recent bickering among the DVD Forum over DVD-RAM specs, (see MMW, Aug. 18, p. 7) it's unclear when DVD-RAM will become part of the PC.
Nevertheless, C-Cube is confident it can achieve price points required to bring the codec to the desktop market.
Christie Cadwell, C-Cube senior marketing manager, said initially the chip will be priced in the hundreds of dollars. To take advantage of the PCI bus, the DVD-RAM chip will offload audio processing and multiplexing tasks to the Pentium.
"We do take audio in and time stamp it and then send it out to do the encoding," Cadwell said. "That makes it tremendously easy to do the synchronization."
As for bringing digital television to the PC, Cadwell said, "the chip is capable of decoding the lowest level of high definition, 480p." That format is being pushed for by the DTV Team, which consists of Microsoft Corp. [MSFT], Intel Corp. [INTC] Compaq Computer Corp. [CPQ]. Lucent Technologies Inc. [LU] is designing chips for DTV on the PC. (see MMW, Aug. 18, p.1)
Cadwell said C-Cube will develop DVx firmware to implement DTV on the PC when the company identifies interest from potential OEM customers.
From JPEG to MPEG-2
On the content authoring side, Cadwell expects C-Cube's MPEG-2 to be an easy sell because the solution will offer tremendous cost savings over JPEG and DVC in terms of storage requirements. One second of JPEG video requires 30 Mb of hard disk space compared with 6 Mb of space needed for a second of MPEG-2, she said. A second of DVC can take up 25 Mb or 50 Mb of disk space.
"We can do it very cost effectively, which is what that market [multimedia authors] was looking for," Cadwell said, explaining that the MPEG-2 will offer "potentially a factor of 10 savings for disk space alone."
Of additional value to content creators is the chip's ability to decode two MPEG-2 streams simultaneously.
To reach developers using the DVC format, C-Cube is developing transcoder technology with Adaptec Inc. [ADPT] that will turn DVC into MPEG-2 (see MMW, April 14, p. 3).
The technology is likely to show up first in a board alongside an MPEG-2 chip or 1394. Expect to see the first working products with the transcoder at NAB. (C-Cube, 408/944-6300; IBM, 914/892-5000; MPEG Associates, 212/363-8500; Semico; 602/997-0337.) |
