Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Technology Stocks : C-Cube -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: John Rieman who wrote (42390)	6/24/1999 12:32:00 PM
From: DiViT	Respond to of 50808

Fun?......... DECODER INDUSTRY SUPPORTS FUN 06/23/1999 Cable Europe (c) 1999 Phillips Business Information, Inc. No sooner had the battle between DF1 and Premiere come to an end through the merger of the two digital pay-TV operators last autumn, than it has been replaced by a new dispute over supremacy in the German decoder market. Both Panasonic and Echostar - two of Europe's leading set - top-box manufacturers - have refused to make digital decoders conforming to the Kirch Group's proprietary d-box standard, and have instead announced their support of the FUN (Free Universal Network) standard. FUN's specifications for open digital decoders favour OpenTV as the embedded middleware (favoured by public broadcaster ARD) rather than Kirch technology subsidiary Beta Research's betanova software, and allow the consumer to choose between different pay-TV operators' services through the inclusion of DVB Common Interface slots. According to FUN, Panasonic (owned by Japanese consumer electronics firm Matsushita) will present its new open digital decoder at the IFA consumer electronics fair in Berlin at the end of August. Next year, Panasonic wants to offer TV sets with an integrated decoder for satellite and terrestrial digital television to the German market. US-based Echostar, meanwhile, plans to enter the German digital set-top-box market this autumn. In Europe, Echostar currently delivers decoders for the platforms offered by Canal Plus and Via Digital. "We have looked very closely at the German market," said Hans Op de Laak, commercial director at Echostar's European Division in Almelo, Holland. "In Germany, pay-TV will remain a niche market. In addition, digital television won't become a success if it is based on out-of- date technology. Therefore we have opted for the open digital platform of Free Universal Network. Through its Common Interface approach it guarantees a maximum of openness for competing pay-TV services." He added that the OpenTV middleware was the "efficient basis for attractive multimedia offerings", citing the freely-available and extensive electronic programme guides produced by public broadcasters ARD and ZDF as just a small foretaste of the system's possibilities.