Panasonic Electronic Devices selects Fresco Microchip's FM1151 for next-gen tuners

TORONTO, CANADA: Fresco Microchip Inc., a developer of leading edge RF, mixed-signal and digital signal processing integrated circuits (ICs), announced that Panasonic Electronic Devices (PED) has selected Fresco's FM1151 universal analog demodulator and digital IF processor IC for its latest hybrid tuners.

PED's next generation VP35HR tuner family is designed for terrestrial and cable broadcasts across Europe, Asia and Latin America. The tuners deliver unmatched audio/video and reliability on next-generation TVs, DVD-Rs, DVRs, and set-top boxes.

By offering improved signal-to-noise, differential gain/phase and excellent adjacent channel rejection, the VP35HR tuners enable sharper visual quality, richer brightness and more vivid color contrast; all features which enrich the TV viewing experience.

PED is a worldwide leader in the development and manufacturing of high quality, innovative consumer electronics, shipping more than 50 million tuners globally every year.

"Fresco's FM1151 raises the bar for television picture quality while significantly streamlining product design and manufacturing," said Toshiyuki Okada, group manager at Panasonic Electronic Devices. "The VP35HR is at the cutting-edge of technology that drives innovation, translating into a marked reduction in system cost."

The FM1151 is the industry's first single-chip receiver for global hybrid markets, offering fully integrated universal analog audio/video demodulation (NTSC, PAL, SECAM) and digital IF processing (DVB-C/T/T2, ATSC, ISDB-T, DTMB, ITU J.83).

Integrating the company's innovative agileSP architecture, the FM1151 marks a new quality standard for picture clarity by significantly reducing the smearing and ringing artifacts common in existing solutions. By using the FM1151, tuner manufacturers can fully optimize image quality through unmatched levels of programmability and are no longer limited to fixed, pre-defined settings common with existing chips.

The FM1151 marks an expansion of the field-proven FM1100 family which sets the industry benchmark for lowering the system solution cost across the product life cycle from design through production.

Using the company's iSAW technology, each chip in the product family eliminates multiple external components, 6/7/8MHz higher-profile SAW filters and several amplifiers. As a result, tuner manufacturers are able to vastly simplify tuner designs and streamline the overall supply chain without compromising performance.

"We are delighted that PED has selected our FM1151 for their latest tuners and that Fresco was able to surpass PED's unparalleled quality standards," said Lance Greggain, CEO, president and co-founder of Fresco Microchip. "As one of the most respected tuner suppliers to the world's largest consumer electronics players, PED's VP35HR showcases leading-edge tuner technology."