* FAROUDJA GOES PUBLIC, SEEKING PRODUCT DIVERSIFICATION
455 Words
3339 Characters
10/13/97
Audio Week
Warren Publishing, Inc.
(Copyright 1997 by Warren Publishing, Inc.)
* Faroudja Labs filed for initial public offering of 3 million
shares of common stock, priced at $8-$10 per share, as company
seeks to expand beyond video enhancement products such as
* line-doublers into rear-projection TVs and PC components. Faroudja
used last month's CEDIA Expo in Atlanta to unveil 48W" and 58W"
rear-projection TVs with built-in line-doublers (AW Sept 15 p7),
and is working with PC advanced accelerator supplier S3 in
developing chips for PCs that contain company's video processing
* technology. S3 signed 5-year agreement with Faroudja and in June
paid $5 million for 526,316 shares of company's common stock,
* Faroudja said in documents filed with SEC. Also under development
are advanced line-multiplier and scaling video processor for
large-screen, high-resolution systems and video processor for LCD
* and Digital Light Processing (DLP) projectors. Faroudja signed deal
with Texas Instruments for DLP earlier this year. It also is
developing up-converter designed to deliver HDTV-quality video from
* NTSC signal. For 6 months ended June 30, Faroudja reported profit
declined to $534,000 from $808,000 from year earlier despite gain
in revenues to $7.8 million from $5.5 million, it said in SEC
documents. At same time, R&D expenses grew to $1.8 million from
* $990,000 as Faroudja set up 5-engineer unit in Phoenix to focus on
very large scale integration (VLSI) ICs. S3 and Vidikron accounted
for 14.9% and 11.4% of revenues, respectively. Exports, largely
line-quadruplers and rear-projection TVs sold in Europe and Asia,
* were 9.5%. Faroudja income dropped to $1.5 million for year ended
Dec. 31 from $4 million despite gain in revenues to $13.1 million
from $11.9 million. Sales to Vidikron accounted for 10.5% of
revenues, while exports were 15.3% of total revenues. Gross profit
* dipped to 63.5% from 64.7%. As of June 30, Faroudja had net book
value of $12.6 million, $11.1 million in working capital, $15.2
million in assets. About 81% of revenues were generated by home
* theater and industrial markets in fiscal 1997. Faroudja sells
products through 330 specialty dealers, company said in SEC filing.
* Before public offering, Faroudja Images Investors, controlled by
N.Y.-based Spencer Trask Securities, owned 3.6 million shares
* (42.1% of company), founder Yves Faroudja, 2 million shares
(23.6%), Images gen. partner Kevin Kimberlin, 1.5 million (17.6%).
* After sale, Faroudja Images stake will fall to 27.2%, Yves Faroudja
17.6%, Kimberlin 13.1%. Investment concern paid $18 million in
* March 1996 for 56.25% ownership in Faroudja. Yves Faroudja was paid
$198,500 salary in 1996, filing said, and Pres.-CEO Michael Moone
$175,000 base salary and $150,000 bonus. Company said it relies on
several companies to build its IC components and products,
including Micro Devices Technology, SGS-Thomson Microelectronics,
and Temic N. America. Bestronics assembles more than 80% of
company's circuit boards and DC Electronics makes wire and cable
harnesses.
I0607 * End of document.
DOCUMENT 79 OF 197
EENG9724100073
News
S3 takes separate video path
Junko Yoshida
237 Words
2005 Characters
09/01/97
Electronic Engineering Times
176
Copyright 1997 CMP Publications Inc.
Redmond, Wash. - Better-than-TV picture quality may become a mantra
for PC OEMs and chip vendors seeking a place in next year's
entertainment PC and digital-TV implementations.
* Working in an exclusive agreement with Faroudja Laboratories Inc.
* (Sunnyvale, Calif.), S3 Inc. will implement Faroudja's proprietary
video-processing technologies in hardware devices.
* One-upping Microsoft Corp.'s Bob and Weave, the S3-Faroudja solutions
look to improve the picture quality not only of 24-frame/second film
based on DVD materials, but of TV-camera-based video materials as well.
* Faroudja is licensing technologies in line-doubling, detail enhancers,
cross-color suppression, motion tracking and compensation and digital
compression filtering.
* S3 will launch Faroudja's technology in two phases, said Scott Tandy,
director of marketing for high-end graphics products at S3 (Santa Clara,
Calif.). First, the company will offer an add-in card that incorporates
* Faroudja's existing multichip solutions along with S3's graphics chip.
It will be sold "most likely not as a retail product but as an
evaluation platform, so that PC OEMs could integrate it inside their
PCs," Tandy said. A PC OEM's bill of materials would rise somewhere
between $200 and $250, he said.
* In phase two, S3 will introduce a single-chip integrating Faroudja's
video-processing technologies and S3's 2-D and 3-D graphics
accelerators.
Microsoft software design engineer Scott MacDonald said S3's efforts
will not conflict with Bob and Weave. "We support their idea," he said,
which he called "a very high-end solution."
Copyright (c) 1997 CMP Media Inc.
I0607 * End of document. |
