Tensilica Adds Coding Technologies' MPEG-4 aacPlus to Xtensa HiFi 2 Audio Engine

Update: Cadence Completes Acquisition of Tensilica (Apr 24, 2013)

Tensilica’s Engine Makes it Easy to Add Audio to New Chip Designs
 
Santa Clara, Calif. – October 6, 2005  – Coding Technologies, the leading provider of audio compression technology for mobile, broadcasting and the Internet and TensilicaÒ, Inc., the leader in automated configurable processor technology, today announced that Tensilica has selected Coding Technologies’ aacPlus codec for its XtensaÒ HiFi 2 Audio Engine. Coding Technologies’ codec has been ported and performance-optimized for the Xtensa HiFi 2 Audio Engine, allowing designers to quickly add high-performance audio functionality to their new chip designs.

“We’ve seen strong demand for MPEG-4 aacPlus among our customers who are interested in adding music download, playback and TV to mobile phones,” stated Steve Roddy, Tensilica’s vice president of marketing. “Coding Technologies is a recognized innovator in digital audio technology and their well executed aacPlus implementation greatly simplified the development of a highly optimized port for our HiFi 2 Audio Engine.”

Already standardized by MPEG, 3GPP and DVB (Digital Video Broadcasting) as the codec for high quality content delivery aacPlus v2 is AAC coupled with Coding Technologies’ SBR (Spectral Band Replication) and Parametric Stereo technologies. Both SBR and Parametric Stereo are backward and forward compatible methods to enhance the efficiency of any audio codec. By using a unique bandwidth extension technique, SBR enables audio codecs to deliver the same quality at half the bit rate. Efficiency is further enhanced with Parametric Stereo for low-bit-rate stereo signals. Using these techniques, aacPlus delivers streaming and downloadable CD-quality stereo at 48 kbps, near CD-quality stereo at 32 Kbps, excellent quality stereo at 24 Kbps, and great quality for mixed content down to 16 Kbps and below, enabling new mobile and digital broadcast applications.

The aacPlus v2 codec is a full superset of aacPlus v1 (includes support for SBR) and AAC-LC.  Codec packages are also available for the Xtensa HiFi2 Audio engine for aacPlus v1 and AAC-LC.

Tensilica’s Xtensa HiFi 2 Audio Engine is an add-on package for Tensilica’s proven Xtensa LX processor, optimized specifically for today’s consumer audio functions. As a low-power turnkey solution, the Xtensa HiFi 2 Audio Engine enables system-on-chip (SOC) designers to quickly design audio-enabled devices such as cellular phones, portable music players, DVD drives, and set-top boxes. The Xtensa HiFi 2 Audio Engine employs an audio-specific set of over 300 audio-specific DSP (digital signal processing) instructions created specifically by the engineers at Tensilica to optimize the Xtensa LX processor for audio.

“Tensilica established a strong customer base with its first Xtensa HiFi Audio Engine,” stated Victor Kanevsky, Sr. Director Strategic Alliances, Coding Technologies. “The addition of aacPlus to their next generation audio engine will provide an extremely competitive offering to leading companies designing advanced mobile devices.”

Pricing and Availability

Pricing starts at $44,000 for the AAC-LC decoder. Designers will also need to license the Xtensa HiFi 2 Audio Engine and the accompanying Xtensa LX processor. All codecs are available now.

About Coding Technologies

Coding Technologies provides the best audio compression for mobile, broadcasting and Internet. SBRTM (Spectral Band Replication) from Coding Technologies is a backward and forward compatible method to enhance the efficiency of any audio codec; putting the “PRO” in mp3PRO and the “plus” in aacPlus. Parametric Stereo from Coding Technologies and Philips again significantly increases the efficiency of audio codecs for stereo signals at low bit rates. Products from Coding Technologies are fundamental enablers of open standards such as MPEG, Digital Radio Mondiale, HD Radio, and the DVD Forum.

Coding Technologies is a privately held company with offices in Sweden, Germany, and Silicon Valley. Founded in 1997 in Stockholm, the company later merged with a spin-off of the renowned Fraunhofer Institute in Germany, the inventor of MP3. Coding Technologies’ customers include America Online, iBiquity Digital, mm02, Nokia, RealNetworks, SK Telecom, Thomson, Texas Instruments, Vodafone, and XM Satellite Radio. For more information, visit www.codingtechnologies.com.

About Tensilica

Tensilica was founded in July 1997 to address the growing need for optimized, application-specific microprocessor solutions in high-volume embedded applications. With a configurable and extensible microprocessor core called Xtensa, Tensilica is the only company that has automated and patented the time-consuming process of generating a customized microprocessor core along with a complete software development tool environment, producing new configurations in a matter of hours. For more information, visit www.tensilica.com.