tru2way

VOD technology provider, SeaChange International, announced last week that it has entered into a binding agreement to acquire all the outstanding shares of VividLogic, a privately owned, California-based provider of software and services to cable operators, set-top box manufacturers and consumer electronics suppliers, whose competitors include Alticast, ADB's Osmosys and enableTV. According to SeaChange, VividLogic's software products include tru2way, MHP and Globally Executable MHP (GEM)-based IPTV operability for set-top box and CE manufacturers, in-home content protection and funded software development for the creation of service provider-sponsored home media gateways.

Due to the volume of news generated by last week's Consumer Electronics Show, and because the [itvt] editorial team is busy working on The TV of Tomorrow Show (March 3rd-4th in San Francisco), we are covering a number of stories in this issue in summary form:

[itvt] has just published the latest edition of Rick Howe's regular column, "The iTV Doctor Is In!" This week's column features Peter Flood, head of business development for North America at Playcast Media, discussing how that company's technology enables video games--including sophisticated console games--to be played on legacy set-top boxes.

DVR vendor/service provider, TiVo, has strongly criticized the US cable industry in a response to a recently issued RFI from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) that seeks "comment on how the Commission can encourage innovation in the market for video devices that will assist the Commission’s development of a National Broadband Plan" (note: for more on the RFI, see the article published on itvt.com, December 7th).

Boulder, Colorado-based start-up, FreedTV, on Wednesday launched what it bills as "the first cross-platform social media television application supporting real-time connectivity to mainstream television set-top boxes." In association with its existing Facebook WIWA (stands for "What I'm Watching") and iPhone applications, the company says, the new FreedTV Video Service Provider (VSP) app "combines the compelling content of broadcast and cable television with the peer-to-peer communication of social networking to create a new standard in interactive television." "Television viewing was once a social experience based on 'event' programming, like 'The Wonderful World of

Evolution Digital--a division of Evolution Broadband, a reseller of digital equipment to independent cable operators--said Tuesday that Compton Communications has become the first Canadian operator to select its TiVo HD DVR offering. "Now that the TiVo HD DVR is a one-box solution in Canada, acting as the sole cable box, TiVo's brand recognition as the world's leading user interface and DVR made it the logical next step to enhance our product offering," Travis Campbell, marketing manager for Compton Communications, said in a prepared statement. "It has been Compton's goal to offer our customers the very best, cutting-edge entertainment choices available.

itaas, an Atlanta-based company that provides a range of software development, integration and testing services for interactive TV (including ETV, tru2way and IPTV solutions), announced Monday that it is expanding its facilities and staff across its US and Indian offices, in order to respond to what it says has been a "significant increase of IP and cable technology initiatives across multiple platforms," and in anticipation of what it expects will be "significant growth" in the interactive TV market next year.

Geneva-based set-top box company, Advanced Digital Broadcast (ADB), announced today that it has demonstrated live that it can "deliver the promise of tru2way for cable system operators and consumers." According to the company, at a recent CableLabs Interop event it showed how its ADB-4820C HD set-top box can seamlessly support the full functionality of both Cisco and Motorola tru2way headends and CableCARDs: the box was first connected to a Cisco headend using a Cisco CableCARD, and displayed Time Warner Cable's TV channels and tru2way interactive guide.

In an ex parte letter, filed with the FCC December 2nd, Panasonic Corporation of North America revealed that it will shortly be offering integrated tru2way HDTV sets in Boston (note: it already offers them in Chicago, Denver and Atlanta), and outlined its plans to launch a retail tru2way "set-back box" (SBB) that would "take advantage of the continuing nationwide roll-out by major cable operators of tru2way capability in their systems" and would "convert Panasonic HDTV's into fully bi-directional 'digital cable ready' tru2way TV's." The box was demo'd by the company at last month's SCTE Cable-Tec Expo.

Korean MHP, tru2way and Blu-ray specialist, Alticast, will later this week announce that it has opened an engineering center in Wroclaw, Poland. The company says that the expansion is in response to "the steady growth of the European MHP/GEM interactive middleware and the imminent publishing of GEM 1.2 Hybrid Broadcast Broadband interactive middleware."

Here is a round-up of some other interactive TV-related stories we didn't have room for in this issue (as well as some stories from the ongoing SCTE Cable-Tec Expo in Denver, which our editorial team was unable to attend):

A number of companies contacted [itvt] Wednesday to let us know about the products and technologies they are exhibiting at the ongoing SCTE Cable-Tec Expo in Denver (October 28th-30th):

Semiconductor company, Broadcom, on Tuesday announced two new Multimedia over Coax Alliance system-on-a-chip (SoC) solutions--the BCM7125 and the BCM7119--which it claims support tru2way, CableCard and a range of other technologies and standards, and which it promises will "enable manufacturers and cable operators to cost-effectively offer the latest in interactive HDTV programming, connectivity, whole-home media distribution [including multiroom HD DVR] and advanced 3D user interfaces to the North American market."

According to the company, key features of the new SoC's include:

At a press briefing in Washington, DC Monday, Comcast EVP, David Cohen (note: Cohen has a broad portfolio that encompasses corporate communications, government affairs, public affairs, and corporate administration) said that the MSO's cable plant should be tru2way-capable by the end of the year, according to an article by John Eggerton in Broadcasting & Cable.