At the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas earlier this month, Comcast, the largest cable MSO in the US, announced that it has signed agreements with Panasonic and Samsung, under which the companies will supply it with its next generation of digital set-top boxes (note: Comcast refers to this line of boxes internally as "RNG," short for "real next-generation"). The boxes will, of course, be OCAP-compatible. The deals are significant, because until now, Comcast's set-tops have been supplied almost entirely by the two companies that dominate the US cable set-top market, Motorola and Scientific-Atlanta (note: last year, though, Comcast did sign a set-top supply agreement with UK- based Pace Micro; in addition, it is currently testing Digeo's Moxi set-top platform).
The deal with Panasonic will, in fact, see the latter supplying Comcast not only with set-tops, but with its own OCAP middleware; in addition Comcast and Panasonic have agreed to jointly explore and develop extensions to the OCAP spec: the companies say that the extensions will, among other things, allow the set-tops to interface easily with a wide variety of Panasonic consumer electronics devices--including plasma TV's, home theater systems and DVD recorders--which will be equipped with Panasonic's HDAVI Control capability. HDAVI Control is designed to allow consumers to activate and operate their digital set-top and any other devices in a home theater set-up with a single remote, through a unified user interface. The companies say they also plan to collaborate on developing a range of consumer applications.
The Panasonic boxes will provide HD DVR capabilities, and offer triple tuners and a minimum of 250GB of storage--almost double the amount available on Comcast's existing DVR set-tops. The boxes will also have both MPEG-2 and MPEG-4/H.264 decoder capabilities: Comcast says that H.264 will not only allow higher video compression rates, but also allow consumers to use their televisions to "enjoy media elements commonly available on the Internet." In addition, the boxes will feature USB 2.0 functionality, allowing them to be connected to other media devices, such as digital cameras. The deal calls for Panasonic to initially supply Comcast with 250,000 of the boxes, and Comcast will have the option of acquiring up to a million of the boxes in the first year, and of ordering additional volumes in subsequent years. The first 250,000 boxes will be loaded with Panasonic's OCAP middleware.
Comcast's new deal with Samsung, meanwhile, will see the latter initially supplying it with 200,000 standard-definition set-tops and, if certain unspecified conditions are met, then supplying an additional 500,000. Shipments will begin in 2007. The boxes, which will make up the low end of the RNG product line, will support MPEG-2 and MPEG-4/H.264, and, will also be designed to leverage DOCSIS 2.0 and USB 2.0 to enable advanced interactive applications and home-network connectivity. "This agreement with Samsung underscores our commitment to providing consumers with an outstanding home entertainment experience," Comcast's EVP of new business development, Steve Silva, said in a prepared statement. "These all-digital boxes will offer customers the advanced services that our industry-leading interactive network makes possible, including video on demand, and the ability to integrate with other consumer media devices."
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