Protocom claims first hardwired MPEG-4 codec for video at full frame rates

Protocom claims first hardwired MPEG-4 codec for video at full frame rates
By Semiconductor Business News
December 14, 2001 (11:03 a.m. EST)
URL: http://www.eetimes.com/story/OEG20011214S0031

CUPERTINO, Calif.--Protocom Technology Corp. today said it will demonstrate the industry's first hardwired chip based on MPEG-4 technology for NTSC/PAL-resolution television images at full frame rates during the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas early next month.

The hardwired chip solution and intellectual property (IP) are targeted at embedding MPEG-4 technology in handheld devices, video conferencing systems, security/surveillance applications, personal video recorders, tape-less digital camcorders, and digital cameras that can capture video like camcorders, said the two-year-old company.

"MPEG-4 is an enabling technology with a wide range of horizontal applications that we are now poised to serve," said Ren-Yuh Wang, president, CEO and founder of Protocom Technology. He said the company's MPEG-4 codec architecture allows the device to "scale appropriately to customer-specific applications."

Protocom said its MPEG-4 solution is fully implemented in hardwired logic and conforms to the ISO/IEC-14496 standard. According to the company, the MPEG-4 codec design offers full-duplex operation and video resolutions compatible with North America's NTSC and Europe's PAL formats, as well as CIF/SIF and OCIF/OSIF standards. The design features real-time variable data rates of 10 kilobits per second to 15 megabits/sec. and it has built-in system interfaces for industry standard components, said the Cupertino startup.

MPEG-4 compression technology is gathering steam, earning keen interest from set-top-box vendors and semiconductor companies hungry to add features to current designs, and from service providers eyeing it for home networking and for set-tops integrated with personal video recorders (see Nov. 30 story).