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Product category: Design and Development Software
News Release from: Cabot Communications | Subject: Mercator
Edited by the Electronicstalk Editorial Team on 26 May 2003

Development kit speeds interactive applications

Mercator is the first 'out-of-the-box' MHEG-5 development kit to help set-top box and interactive digital TV manufacturers keep pace with the fast-evolving UK MHEG-5 digital standard

Mercator is the first 'out-of-the-box' MHEG-5 development kit to help set-top box and interactive digital TV manufacturers keep pace with the fast-evolving UK MHEG-5 digital standard and bring products to market more quickly, with a greater range of interactive applications. Cabot Communications believes Mercator will help manufacturers respond to rapidly growing consumer demand for the Freeview digital terrestrial platform, which is based on the MHEG-5 standard for interactive services and digital teletext.

Sales of 3 million Freeview receivers are predicted in 2003, with over 800,000 sales to date.

Until the launch of Mercator, a high level of integration has been required to add MHEG-5 applications to set-top boxes and iDTVs, making it costly and difficult to bring new products to market quickly.

Mercator solves this problem by offering standardised interfaces and components, allowing easy integration to significantly reduce engineering time and effort.

An independent benchmark has shown that Mercator is 42% faster than alternative solutions for digital interactive applications, allowing manufacturers to respond to consumer demand for faster applications.

Yehia Oweiss, Managing Director of Hauppauge Computer Works, a major supplier of digital terrestrial receivers said: "With our newly Launched DEC 1000-t Freeview adapter along with our WinTV Nova Family, Hauppauge Digital is pleased to be working with Cabot to deliver the most optimised MHEG solutions in the UK market".

Mercator is a complete, packaged development kit including object libraries and full documentation, allowing set-top box and integrated TV (iDTV) manufacturers to quickly add MHEG-5 support for the burgeoning UK market.

Mercator is available for most CPU architectures and includes the CHIL (Cabot high level interface) API for platform independence.

Unlike alternative MHEG-5 engines, Mercator was developed as an embedded implementation and therefore has low memory requirements and high performance.

In addition, Mercator makes upgrades of the evolving MHEG-5 standard a straightforward process, significantly reducing the cost of maintaining product lines for manufacturers.

Keith Potter, Managing Director of Cabot Communications believes Mercator will make a major contribution to the development of digital terrestrial TV in the UK: "Previously MHEG-5 was a major and costly integration effort causing a real headache for manufacturer's product release schedule.

With Mercator we believe we have designed the product that the market desperately needed in order to realise the full potential of digital terrestrial TV".

Mercator is the 3rd generation MHEG-5 engine from Cabot, who first demonstrated the first MHEG-5 engine in 1998.

The Cabot MHEG-5 has been adopted by 11 manufacturers and is currently being shipped in 40% of the receivers available in the UK.

Combined with Cabot's Eclipse DVB-T middleware and Callisto over-air download module, manufacturers now have an out-of-the-box digital terrestrial receiver solution to cover all of Europe.

The additional specialised MHEG-5 and DVB-T testing and consultancy services available from Cabot ensure a market-ready, robust and stable solution.

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