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  • Set-top Box Capable of HD Content Over DVB-T2


    Pace plc, a developer of digital TV technologies, has made the first set-top box capable of receiving and displaying DVB-T2 HD content.

    The prototype consists of the world’s first DVB-T2 front-end (the silicon tuner TDA18211 and a prototype of the forthcoming demodulator TDA10055) from NXP Semiconductors and a Pace high definition terrestrial set-top box.

    It will receive a live MPEG-4 HD stream from an Enensys DVB-T2 Modulator based at the DVB (Digital Video Broadcasting) stand at the IBC 2008 show in Amsterdam, which begins on Friday.

    DVB-T2 brings efficiencies of between 30-50 per cent in its use of spectrum compared to DVB-T and is expected to be a key enabler to the roll out of high definition TV in the UK over Freeview.

    Earlier this month, the BBC succesfully received high def pictures compliant to the DVB-T2 standard using a real-time demodulator during test transmissions.

    As a set-top box developer, Pace has been involved in the creation of the DVB-T2 draft standard, focusing on key technical aspects that add to the improvement and robustness of the standard, which was only confirmed in June this year.

    Darren Fawcett, chief technologist for Wireless Systems at Pace plc said the take up of high definition services within mature TV markets was picking up speed.

    He said it was expected to grow substantially over the next five years. “But this HD content is currently in the cable and satellite domains,” he said.

    “To enable terrestrial services to compete effectively with the other platforms, DVB-T2 is an essential move.

    “As we saw with the shift to the DVB-S2 standard for satellite services, the extra efficiencies in the use of the spectrum will make the option of delivering HD via DTT viable.”

    With DVB-T2 the DVB Project offers broadcasters a means of using that spectrum in the most efficient ways possible using state of the art technology.

    The first country to deploy DVB-T2 is likely to be the UK, where ASO is already under way.

    The regulator there, Ofcom, has stated its intention to convert one nationwide multiplex to DVB-T2 with the first transmissions of multichannel HDTV set to begin at the end of 2009.

    Test transmissions began immediately after the approval of the standard in June 2008.

  • Nokia dominates global smartphone ad traffic

    Nokia may lead the world in smartphone mobile ad traffic rankings but iPhone fastest growing device

    Smartphones accounted for 25.8 per cent of worldwide mobile ad traffic in August, up 3.4 per cent since May 2008, according to AdMob’s August 2008 Mobile Metrics Report.

    Nokia dominates globally, with a 62.4 per cent slice of the traffic in August and more than 50 per cent in every region except North America. In the US, where Nokia does not have a top 20 ranked smartphone, RIM rules the roost.

    The Canadian company has 31.2 per cent of US smartphone traffic and manufactures three of the top 10 devices.

    According to the report, the Apple iPhone was the fastest growing device in the world last month and ended August with more than 2.9 million ad requests per day.

    AdMob stores and analyzes data from every ad request, impression and click and uses this information to optimize ad matching.
    In the latest report, AdMob has highlighted the rapid and global growth of smartphone usage.

    The anticipated launch of new smartphones in the coming months, including the first of Google’s Android phones, the RIM Bold, and the Nokia N96, is a strong indication that this growth is likely to continue throughout the year.

    According to the report, the iPhone ended August with more than 2.9 million requests per day.

    The top five smartphones in the US – the BlackBerry Pearl, Palm Centro, BlackBerry Curve, Apple iPhone, and Samsung Instinct – generated 12.9 per cent of all US traffic in August, a 2.4 per cent increase over July.

    Other highlights from the August 2008 report:

    * RIM is in second place worldwide with 10.8 per cent of smartphone traffic with the large majority of that coming from North America.

    * Motorola and SonyEriccson have a large share of overall mobile traffic, but neither has a smartphone ranked in the top 20 worldwide.

    * Smartphones continue to increase marketshare in the US, accounting for 23.7 per cent of traffic in August, up 3.5 percent since May 2008.

  • Symbian Foundation support continues to grow


    A further nine companies have thrown their weight behind the planned Symbian Foundation.

    Last week Nokia announced it had reached an agreement with Samsung to buy the remaining share in Symbian, clearing the way for the completion of the plans outlined in June.

    The new companies are Acrodea, Brycen, HI Corporation, Ixonos, KTF, Opera Software, Sharp, TapRoot Systems and UIQ.

    As well as comprising some well known Symbian names, the newcomers represent device manufacturers (in the form of Sharp and KTF) and a strong showing of software engineering and middleware companies.

    Since June, 40 companies have confirmed commitment to the initiative, including the ten initial board members: AT&T, LG Electronics, Motorola, Nokia, NTT DOCOMO, Samsung Electronics, Sony Ericsson, STMicroelectronics, Texas Instruments and Vodafone.

    Mats Lindoff, Sony Ericsson’s chief technology officer, said: “We are happy to see that so many developers and partners in the industry have expressed their support for the plans for the Symbian Foundation, as this will help drive the next level of innovation needed to deliver new user experiences on mobile phones."

    Bob Bicksler, CEO of TapRoot Systems, said: “We’re excited about the plans for the Symbian Foundation and believe it will increase the proliferation of innovative products and services to mobile consumers.”

  • Market for mobile touch screen worth US$5bn in 2009


    Apple’s iPhone has done much to thrust touch screens firmly into the public’s consciousness – a place they seem certain to increasingly inhabit.

    A report from ABI Research forecasts that revenue from the global touch screen market for smartphones and other handheld devices such as MIDs, UMPCs, and PNDs will reach USD $5 billion in 2009.

    Shipments of touch screen-based mobile devices increased 91 per cent in 2007 compared to the previous year.

    Yet according to Kevin Burden, research director at ABI, said nearly all mobile handset manufacturers were getting into touch screens to a greater or lesser extent.

    But he added that there were strong regional differences in the uptake of touch screens.

    The Asia/Pacific market, where more than 80 per cent of the world’s touch screen-based mobile phone production was consumed over the past year, has been a major driver in the rising demand.

    “The acceptance of touch screens to date has varied by geographic region, which has been a significant factor in determining the success of individual handset vendors,” he said.

    Samsung and Motorola have been the most successful, commanding 33 per cent and 30 per cent shares of the touch screen mobile phone market respectively.

    “Samsung and Motorola lead the market for touch screen phones primarily because of their scale and significant presence in the Asian markets,” said Burden.

    “Because it’s difficult to represent even a fraction of the common Asian characters on a QWERTY-style keyboard, touch screen devices on which characters can be written with a stylus are immensely popular.”

    At 24 per cent, Sony Ericsson has the third-largest market share, while all the other handset vendors – including Apple – are essentially niche players.

    The ABI report said that a number of factors are driving further adoption of touch screen-based mobile devices.

    *Consumers are looking for more intuitive user interfaces and personalization options as device functionality increases.

    *Prices for touch components and panels continue to decrease and are falling on an average of nearly 10 per cent per annum.

  • AOL messaging comes to Blackberry

    RIM partners with AOL to bring AOL Mail, AIM and ICQ to the Blackberry

    AOL’s email and instant messaging applications, AIM and ICQ, are to be embedded in Blackberry smartphones.

    While all three of the AOL features will only be available in the US initially, they are to be expanded to other markets shortly.

    RIM and AOL have developed native BlackBerry applications for both of the IM clients to ensure they work effectively on the Canadian-made handsets.

    AOL Mail for BlackBerry is built on the “push e-mail” architecture that RIM’s smartphones are already equipped with.

    Once installed on a BlackBerry device, AOL Mail will offer the same features as the desktop version, synchronizing data and content with the users’ online account.

    For those with BlackBerry OS 4.5 or later, emails can be viewed in HTML format and Microsoft Office attachments downloaded.

    Kevin Conroy, executive vice president at AOL, said he was thrilled to be collaborating with RIM.

    “By integrating our AOL Mail, AIM and ICQ services with the BlackBerry platform, users will have an exceptional mobile communications experience anytime, anywhere,” he said.

    Mark Guibert, vice president, corporate marketing at Research In Motion, said the BlackBerry platform offered unparalleled email and messaging capabilities for mobile customers.

    “We are very pleased to be working with AOL to enable a rich mobile experience on BlackBerry smartphones for the tens of millions of people who use AOL Mail, AIM and ICQ.”

    BlackBerry users can download both AIM and ICQ from the BlackBerry official website.

    Meanwhile, Nokia is looking at RIM’s business appeal by expanding the number of devices automatically capable of accessing Microsoft corporate e-mail.

    The Finnish company has said it will embed Microsoft Exchange Activesync on all Nokia phones that use the S60 Symbian operating system.

    This will mean 43 different models of Nokia phones will have easy access to Microsoft corporate email.

    Nokia will also add the Microsoft Exchange support to all new N-Series and E-Series phones that hit the market in the future.
    Prior to this announcement Nokia offered Microsoft email support as a download for only a handful of devices.

    But the feature wasn’t well publicized, and it was somewhat difficult to download.

    The enhancement is significant, especially in the US, where Nokia has not made inroads in a smartphone market dominated by BlackBerry devices.

  • Date announced for Xperia X1 release

    Sony Ericsson announces firm date for first countries to receive the XPERIA X1

    The UK, Germany and Sweden will be the inaugural launch sites for Sony Ericsson’s Xperia X1 when it is released on 30 September.

    The Windows Mobile 6.1 smartphone will then be rolled out around the world with 32 more countries in Asia, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and Latin America expected to get the handset by the fourth quarter of the year.

    North America, China, Australia, and Russia are also listed as committed launch regions, though dates for those are still to be announced.

    There is to be a “live global webcast” hosted by Sony Ericsson on 15 September to demonstrate the Xperia X1 “in-depth”.

    This will be followed by the first of the nine episodes from the Johnny X reality thriller. A Q&A session will also be held on Sony Ericsson’s Premiere website.

    Rikko Sakaguchi, senior VP and head of creation and development at Sony Ericsson, said the in-depth demonstration on the web cast would showcase how the handset was “truly unique”.

    He said the nine panel eco-system put the user in total control of the primary experiences available on the phone and allowed consumers to personalize the panel interface to suit their needs and lifestyle.

    “The Xperia X1 has the highest quality screen on the market, four-way navigation keys and optical joy stick to give a stress-less browsing experience and, with its super fast processor and network speed the Xperia X1 really bridges the gap between personal, entertainment and work mobile needs,” he said.

    The first device from Sony Ericsson’s Xperia sub-brand, the X1 has many high-end features, including: a 3 inch TFT touchscreen display with accelerometer and a wide 800 x 480 pixel resolution, a panel-based interface to work with Windows Mobile 6.1, global GSM and HSDPA connectivity, a full QWERTY keyboard, internal GPS and A-GPS, Wi-Fi and full HTML browser, a 3.2 MP auto focus camera with flash and video recording, lots of multimedia-oriented goodies and 400MB of expandable memory.

    Before the actual availability of the new handset, Sony Ericsson will showcase it at Tent London, between September 18 and September 21, during the London Design Week. No price has yet been released for the Xperia X1.

    A full list of the countries earmarked for Xperia X1 release in 2008:

    – Europe: Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Hungary, Italy, The Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain and Switzerland

    – Asia: Bangladesh, Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam

    – The Middle East: Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and UAE

    – Latin America: Argentina, Chile, Bolivia, Paraguay and Uruguay

    – Africa: South Africa.

  • Leading VoIP Developer In Agreement with Codima

    Selects Codima VoIP Solution For Japanese Governmental NGN Project

    Codima Inc, a global provider of best practice software tools for VoIP and IT Asset Management, has announced it has entered a partnership agreement with Artiza Networks, Japan’s leading Network and VoIP Testing Solution developer.

    To supply the Next Generation Network (NGN) project, Artiza Networks has selected the comprehensive VoIP management solution Codima Toolbox.

    Artiza Networks will provide the solution offered by Codima to enable their customers, including leading Japanese IT corporations to build the new Japanese IP-based infrastructure.

    The Japanese Next Generation Network (NGN) project requires fundamental investments in infrastructure technology.

    Analyst IDC Japan values the network management market alone at US$7.75 billion over the next three years.

    To address this significant demand Artiza Networks has decided to select the Codima VoIP Solution and prioritize the project by forming a specific NGN Group.

    The group will target the customer base including major system integrators, telecom carriers and telecommunications manufacturers.

    Artiza Networks required a comprehensive end-to-end solution to monitor and troubleshoot SIP-based VoIP systems in real time with options for pre-assessment testing and engineer’s kits.

    Codima delivers a suite of products that is ideal for these purposes. Specifically Codima’s flagship products autoVoIP, providing robust post-deployment monitoring and troubleshooting to ensure Quality of Service (QoS) and autoMap with its unique capabilities to map and visualize IT networks directly with Microsoft Office Visio are of interest to enable cost efficient VoIP network management.

    The ground breaking governmental initiative involving Japan’s leading IT corporations NEC, Fujitsu OKI and Hitachi, transforms Japan’s analogue telephone network into an IP-based infrastructure for unified communications.

    According to Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, 100 per cent of the Japanese population will have access to broadband connections by 2010.

    The Japanese External Trade Organization Jetro estimates that the converged network market in Japan was worth 59.3 trillion yen (US$485 billion) in 2007 and will balloon to 87.6 trillion yen (US$740 billion) by 2010.

    Christer Mattsson, CEO of Codima, said: “We are proud to form a partnership with Artiza Networks, an experienced industry leader in Japan.
    “The local partnership will open up channels to resell our products to the NGN project, a governmental initiative of a magnitude that holds unparalleled business opportunities for companies like Codima.”

    Takashi Tokonami, CEO of Artiza Networks, said: “Codima Toolbox met our requirements for a comprehensive VoIP management solution.

    “Being a supplier to the Japanese network market for almost twenty years, we consider the market is shifting toward Next Generation Network, and it boosts up Codima Toolbox.”

  • Williams to distribute Syspine VoIP Phone System in Canada


    Quanta Computer has announced that Williams Telecommunications Corp will be serving as a master distributor of the Syspine Digital Operator Phone System throughout Canada.

    Syspine, an advanced IP phone system designed for small businesses with up to 50 employees, was created for ease of use, low costs and integration with other technologies.

    Featuring Microsoft Response Point technology, Syspine has a powerful voice-recognition system that can be linked with a company’s internal phone directory, as well as an individual’s Microsoft Office Outlook address book.

    Robert Gordon, director of sales and marketing at Syspine, said Williams Telecommunications was a well-known and respected name in the telecom industry.

    “It’s a win-win situation. Williams’ network of dealers and resellers will be able to introduce Syspine to an untapped market, while this is an equally great opportunity for Williams to deliver an affordable VoIP phone system with Microsoft Response Point technology to small businesses in Canada,” he said.

    Headquartered in Mississauga, Ontario, Williams distributes products from many of the major manufacturers, as well as a complete line of peripheral products.

    Jim Willians, president and CEO of Williams, said VoIP is growing exponentially and Williams had been there right from the beginning.

    “We have always been inspired by the latest technology and its opportunities and are excited to partner with Syspine, to distribute their Digital Operator Phone System, and Microsoft, which supplies their Response Point technology to the system,” he said.

    “This new product is easily and rapidly deployed and offers customers flexibility, stability and scalability, as well as the latest features.”

  • Intel PCs to wake up for VoIP phone calls

    A wake-up call for the PC: Intel-powered computers to snap out of sleep when you phone them

    Intel is unveiling new technology that will let computers wake up from their power-saving sleep state when they receive a phone call over the Internet.

    Current computers have to be fully “on” to receive a call, making them impractical and energy-wasters as replacements for the telephone.

    The new Intel component will let computers automatically return to a normal, full-powered state when a call comes in. The computer can activate its microphone and loudspeaker to alert the user, then connect the call.

    Trevor Healy, chief executive of Jajah, which will be the first Internet telephone company to utilize the feature, said: “This certainly helps the PC become a much better center of communications in the home.”

    Joe Van De Water, director of consumer product marketing for Intel , said the first Intel motherboards with the Remote Wake capability will be shipping in the next month.

    These components, which are at the heart of every computer, will most likely be used by smaller computer manufacturers. Bigger names like Dell Inc. and Hewlett-Packard Co. use their own motherboard solutions, but Intel is working to supply them with the technology as well.

    The four initial Remote Wake motherboards will be for desktop computers and will need an Internet connection via Ethernet cable, as Wi-Fi doesn’t work in sleep mode.

    Van De Water said the computer will know to wake up only for calls from services to which the user has subscribed, so computer-waking prank calls should be impossible.

  • Data Center Expertise Increasingly Valued

    Computer data center experts are being shown new respect, according to The New York Times, and the trend is set to continue.

    In Silicon Valley, mechanical engineers who design and run computer data centers have traditionally been regarded as little more than blue-collar workers in the high-tech world.

    For years, the mission of data center experts was to keep the computing power plants humming, while scant thought was given to rising costs and energy consumption.

    Today, they are no longer taken for granted as data centers grow to keep pace with the demands of Internet-era computing, according to a report in The New York Times.

    As a result of their immense need for electricity and their inefficient use of that energy, data centers pose environmental, energy and economic challenges

    That means people with the skills to design, build and run a data center that does not endanger the power grid are suddenly in demand.

    Their status is growing, as are their salaries — climbing more than 20 per cent in US in the last two years into six figures for experienced engineers.

    Jonathan G. Koomey, a consulting professor of environmental engineering at Stanford University, said: “The data center energy problem is growing fast, and it has an economic importance that far outweighs the electricity use.

    “So that explains why these data center people, who haven’t gotten a lot of glory in their careers, are in the spotlight now.”

    Chandrakant Patel, a mechanical engineer at Hewlett-Packard Labs, said that data centers can be made 30 per cent to 50 per cent more efficient just by applying current technology.

    Patel, who has worked in Silicon Valley for 25 years, said that at one time, “we were seen as sheet metal jockeys”.
    “But now we have a chance to change the world for the better, using engineering and basic science,” he said.

    No letup in demand for data center computing

    Digital Realty Trust, a data center landlord with more than 70 facilities, said that customer demand for new space is running 50 per cent ahead of its capacity to build and equip data centers for the next two years.

    For every new center, new data center administrators need to be hired.

    Indeed, some data managers with only a degree from a two-year college can command a USD $100,000 salary.

    Trade and professional conferences for data center experts, unheard of years ago, are now commonplace.

    Five-figure signing bonuses, retention bonuses and generous stock grants have become ingredients in the compensation packages of data center experts today.

    The pace of the data center buildup is the result of the surging use of server computers, which in the United States rose to 11.8 million in 2007, from 2.6 million a decade earlier, according to IDC, a research firm.

    Worldwide, the 10-year pattern is similar, with the server population increasing more than fourfold to 30.3 million by 2007.

    Based on current trends, by 2011 data center energy consumption will nearly double again, requiring the equivalent of 25 power plants. The world’s data centers, according to recent study from McKinsey & Company, could well surpass the airline industry as a greenhouse gas polluter by 2020.

    Because the task ahead, analysts say, is not just building new data centers, but also overhauling the old ones, the managers who know how to cut energy consumption are at a premium.

    Most of the 6,600 data centers in America, analysts say, will be replaced or retrofitted with new equipment over the next several years.

    They apparently have little choice. Analysts point to surveys that show 30 per cent of American corporations are deferring new technology initiatives because of data center limitations.

    Mechanical and electrical engineers with experience in data center design, air-flow modeling and power systems management are in demand.

    Now that costs and energy consumption are priorities, the data center gurus are getting a hearing and new respect.