Tru2way™ Brand to Succeed 'OpenCable™ Platform' in Consumer and Retail Settings

New Brand Makes Major Splash at CES 2008

The U.S. cable industry has adopted the “tru2way™” brand to succeed use of the term “OpenCable™ Platform” as it applies to the marketing and branding of the interactive video platform for consumers and in retail markets.

As the cable industry was rolling out the new tru2way™ brand during the International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas last week, numerous consumer electronics, software and high-tech companies were showing tru2way-enabled products and services to attendees and the press. This included demonstrations of the technology by CE manufacturers who hold more than 28% of global television sales (iSuppli Corp., 9/07).

CableLabs will license the brand to cable companies, cable programmers, and consumer electronics manufacturers that will deliver, create or build devices to access tru2way applications and services. Most cable companies plan to advertise, use, and support the tru2way technology. Use of the mark on devices capable of receiving such services is strictly voluntary for manufacturers.

Tru2way technology is built into televisions, set-top boxes, and other devices enabling cable companies and other interactive television service and application developers to “write” interactive applications such as games once and see them run successfully on any cable television system that supports the specification.

The technology has been licensed by several dozen application authoring entities and equipment manufacturers, including Digeo, LG Electronics, Panasonic Corporation of America, and Samsung Electronics Co., and by chip makers Broadcom and Intel.

The tru2way technology enables consumers to access two-way digital cable programming without the need for a cable operator-supplied set-top box and is capable of supporting all cable services now delivered to devices currently leased to consumers as well as future services written to the tru2way technology. Major cable operators have committed to deploy support for the tru2way platform in service areas covering more than 90 million U.S. homes by the end of 2008.

CES A Landmark Event
"The 2008 CES was a landmark event for the cable industry," said Dr. Richard R. Green, CableLabs President & CEO. "It permitted us to showcase our partnerships with leading consumer electronics manufacturers to develop TVs and other devices that will free consumers from the set-top box. The deployment of tru2way technology is the next evolution of TV in America."

Four of the world's leading consumer electronics companies demonstrated tru2way-based products at CES 2008:

Panasonic—Displayed 42" and 50" tru2way plasma televisions, part of their Viera line that will operate without a set-top box from a single remote and that will be in the marketplace by the 2008 holiday season.
Samsung—Demonstrated a tru2way HD set-top box that was running the Comcast/TV Guide program guide, model DCB-H670C.
LG Electronics—Showed its Model 42LG51—LCD television with tru2way functionality.
Thomson—Exhibited a tru2way set-top box, the "9000 Series—HD MPEG-2/4 Interactive Cable Decoder for the North American market".

At the show, Panasonic and Comcast also teamed to announce a new portable digital video recorder (P-DVR) that uses tru2way technology. The device, called AnyPlay™ P-DVR, allows customers to record programming at home and take it with them for viewing wherever they go.

Additional companies are developing software, toolkits, chipsets and interfaces to support the cable industry's plans to use tru2way technology to deliver interactive services to consumers. Companies that exhibited specific tru2way innovations at CES included:

VividLogic—Demonstrated tru2way software. Its customers include Funai, Mitsubishi and Pioneer.
ViXS and Advanced Micro Devices both showed CableCARD™ chipsets that support tru2way technology.
Digeo—Demonstrated its Moxi Media Center, which integrates content sources throughout an advanced user interface and centralizes all sources of entertainment on a single TV screen.

The cable industry also is working with Microsoft and other companies in the personal computer industry to enable tru2way on future Windows Media Center PCs, thus allowing reception of all cable digital services through the PC without requiring a separate set-top box.

An intermediate state toward this goal, called the OpenCable Unidirectional Receiver (OCUR, enabled by a removable CableCARD security device), currently allows some cable content to flow to PCs. Among exhibits at CES indicating a growing level of support for OCUR:

Dell—Showed an interface to Media Center PCs.
Hewlett Packard—Demonstrated an interface to Media Center PCs.
Sony (Vaio)—Exhibited an interface to Media Center PCs.

The interface to Media Center PCs has also been built into high-end home media management systems. These include:

Niveus Media—Debuted an interface to Media Center PC integrated into a high-end home media management system.
Life/Ware (Exceptional Innovations)—Showed an interface to Media Center PCs built into high-end home media management and home automation systems.

To facilitate the growth of tru2way technology, CableLabs is strengthening resources for both hardware and applications developers, and plans to make specific announcements regarding developer partnerships in the near future. More information about CableLabs' application developer resources can be found at www.opencable.com/ocap.

Developers' conferences are planned for mid-May at the 2008 Cable Show in New Orleans and also at the JavaOne developers' conference in early May in San Francisco.

The tru2way brand was developed by the global brand consulting firm Siegel + Gale, in consultation with the Cable & Telecommunications Association for Marketing (CTAM), the National Cable & Telecommunications Association (NCTA), and marketing and technology representatives of a variety of major cable providers.

Additional information may be found at www.tru2way.com.

In This Issue ...

Tru2way™ Brand to Succeed 'OpenCable™ Platform' in Consumer and Retail Settings

CableLabs® Awards Industry ‘First’ With DOCSIS® 3.0 Qualification

CableLabs® Announces Innovative Switched Digital Solution for One-Way Digital Cable Ready Devices

ITU Study Group 9 Approves Standards for IPTV and VoIP

CableNET®, Cable's Innovation Technology Showcase, Now Accepting Demo Proposals

CableLabs® Hosts Interoperability Event For Tru2way™ Applications

To be included on the SPECS News & Technology from CableLabs® e-mail subscription list ...

www.cablelabs.com

Print This Page