Humax Highlights MHEG Supports And Joins IMPALA

IMPALA, the international MHEG Promotion Alliance, has announced that leading receiver supplier Humax has joined.
Humax is globally recognised for its pioneering efforts in the digital TV industry, particularly in the digital TV recorder (DTR) market.
Bob Hannent, Chief Technologist at Humax, said: "As a long time user of MHEG and a participant in DTG standards definition for MHEG, Humax is keen to demonstrate its support for this very useful middleware by joining IMPALA."
Hannent added: "After a period overshadowed by much larger interactive middlewares, the smaller size and simplicity of MHEG is now being seen as an advantage by far more than just the UK market. While MHEG has a history of existing in very small footprint boxes it is not just for small applications; its continuing extension for HD and the UK's Freesat has shown how flexible it can be."
Hannent highlights the interest from international groups in high-end products with embedded MHEG at IBC 2008. He concluded: "The Humax demonstration of MHEG running on an HD set-top box attracted great interest and the industry is keen to see what else can be achieved with the potential of the broadband interaction channel and other extensions."
Giri Valliappan, Director of Market Development at IMPALA, said: "Humax is a major player in the international receiver market with a tremendous reputation for innovation and quality. We are delighted that the company has joined IMPALA and is highlighting such strong commercial reasons for doing so."
MHEG-5 is a public standard with country or region-specific profiles. Both free-to-air and pay-TV broadcasters are now looking into and deploying MHEG-5 as a low-cost middleware solution for rollout over terrestrial, satellite and cable platforms.
IMPALA's role is to provide guidance and advice to ensure the standard is adopted and implemented correctly and to expand its reach globally.
The founder members of IMPALA are Strategy & Technology (S&T), Cabot Communications and EchoStar Europe.
Further information is available at: www.impala.org and www.humaxdigital.com.
(KMcA)