Siano Launches Next Generation Mobile Digital TV Receiver Chip

New single-chip receiver family extends Siano's multi-standard leadership to Japan/Brazil markets; Field trials in Europe, Japan and Korea show unprecedented performance

NETANYA, Israel--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Leading mobile TV chip maker Siano Mobile Silicon (www.siano-ms.com) announced today the launch of a new family of Mobile Digital TV (MDTV) receiver chips called the SMS1100. Following successful field trials in Europe, Japan and Korea, the SMS1100 raises the bar in the Mobile TV industry with respect to receiver performance, richness of features, power consumption, and global coverage. The SMS1100, a single receiver chip, notably supports reception of ISDB-T TV signals, the broadcast standard of Brazil and Japan, in addition to Siano's existing portfolio of DVB-H, DVB-T, DAB, DAB-IP and T-DMB. Siano is the only mobile TV chip maker that provides a global footprint of mobile TV "coverage" on one single chip – including Russia, Western Europe, Korea, Japan, South East Asia, and Brazil, with further developments expected in China and the US.

“2008 will witness the expansion of mobile TV beyond Japan, Korea and Italy into most of Europe, South East Asia, China and Brazil”

Another anchor feature of the new SMS1100 is the introduction of exceptionally high mobility and sensitivity performance, unprecedented in the industry. By incorporating a new, patented, state-of-the-art channel estimation engine to the chip, Siano has raised the sensitivity and mobility performance to unparalleled industry levels. Field trials already conducted with the SMS1100 show that end users are able to watch mobile TV in garages and other "deep-indoor" locations, or while riding the world's fastest trains such as France's TGV or Japan's Shinkansen (Bullet Train), or whilst driving on Germany's Autobahn highway.

Siano has also broken its own world record in low power consumption, which impacts battery life of the mobile TV terminals. As an example, the SMS1100 consumes less than 165 milliwatt (tuner and baseband combined) when receiving High Definition TV (HDTV) over DVB-T broadcast – 70% less than competing solutions, which means many more hours of watching TV with no battery re-charge.

"2008 will witness the expansion of mobile TV beyond Japan, Korea and Italy into most of Europe, South East Asia, China and Brazil," said Alon Ironi, Siano's CEO. "At the same time, DVB-T technology, already broadcasted in over 40 countries worldwide is now available on-the-go, with many HDTV channels set to be introduced. Whilst our previous SMS1000 chip family enabled the very first deployments of mobile TV, the new SMS1100 will now make mobile TV accessible everywhere, in crystal-clear quality – this product is the locomotive that will pull the entire industry and unleash the huge potential of the mobile TV market," added Ironi.

Similar to Siano's previous generation, the new SMS1100 integrates both RF tuner and demodulator (baseband), and eliminates the need for any active external components. The SMS1100 family can be tailored for several different specific markets and applications. For example, the SMS1150 addresses global mobile TV notebooks, with High-Speed USB 2.0 interface and full MRC diversity support, while the SMS1130 targets DVB-H cell phones.

The SMS1100 is available in samples now, with mass-production in Q1 2008. All members of the SMS1100 family are delivered in the same BGA package, 6.2 x 6.5 x 1 mm in size, 131 pins. Siano will demonstrate the SMS1100 in the up-coming CES trade show in Las Vegas, during January 7-10 (booth #6538MP, LVCC, North Hall).

About Siano Mobile Silicon

Siano Mobile Silicon provides integrated silicon receiver and antenna chips for the mobile digital TV (MDTV) market. Tailored specifically for handheld and mobile devices, the company’s multi-standard solutions overcomes formidable engineering challenges such as mobility reception, hand-offs, power consumption, form factor and small antenna. Since its establishment in 2004 Siano raised $34.5M from JVP, Walden Israel, Star Ventures, and Bessemer Venture Partners. The company has 75 employees and is headquartered in Israel, with sales and customer support offices in Beijing, Taipei, Seoul and the Silicon Valley. For additional information on Siano Mobile Silicon’s solutions, please visit www.siano-ms.com.