Ericsson announces world’s first HEVC encoder for live TV delivery to mobile devices

Enables an enhanced TV viewing experience for consumers using handheld devices
Provides up to 50 per cent saving in delivery bandwidth, while improving picture quality
Extends Ericsson’s history of market led world-firsts for next-generation compression

IBC 2012 (Booth 1.D61) will see the Ericsson (NASDAQ:ERIC) market launch of the world’s first HEVC/H.265 encoder for the delivery of live and linear TV over mobile networks, to mobile devices. Capable of real-time encoding at resolutions up to HD, the new Ericsson SVP 5500 HEVC encoder greatly reduces bandwidth requirements for current and future services. It enables operators to deliver consistent, high quality TV experiences on mobile devices and to meet growing consumer expectations for TV Anywhere services, whether in the home or on the move.

Ericsson ConsumerLab research shows that as much as 50 per cent of the TV/video consumption on smartphones is today done out of the home, up 5 per cent since 2011. A July 2012 report from Juniper Research suggests that the number of streamed mobile TV users on smartphones will increase to 240 million by 2014. A driver for this growth is the strong desire by consumers to access time-critical content such as live sports and news as they occur, and interact with socially.

“As operators strive to keep pace with the multi-screen consumer demand, they are facing increased strain on their networks. There is an immediate need for new video compression solutions that enable high quality pictures over mobile networks, while keeping bandwidth and storage costs as low as possible,” said Dr. Giles Wilson, Head of TV Compression Business, Ericsson. “We understand the dynamics of consumer and operator needs, and the launch of the Ericsson SVP 5500 encoder demonstrates our ability to make first to market moves that allow next-generation TV experiences to become mass market reality.”

High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC) promises to reduce the bandwidth requirements for video delivery by over 50 per cent compared to leading H.264 / MPEG-4 AVC implementations and to revolutionize delivery of TV services to all devices. Ericsson has recognized the first applications for this next-generation compression standard are for TV service delivery over mobile networks, to mobile devices, and the launch of this industry-first encoder responds to real customer needs.

“We are seeing a dramatic change in consumer habits towards TV – they still want to watch at home on their HD screen, but they increasingly expect to consume content on other all devices, whether in the home via Wi-Fi or out the house using mobile 3G and 4G networks,” said Ove Anebygd, Vice President and Head of TV, Ericsson. “Consumers are looking to find simple, enjoyable and seamless ways to consume any content, any way and anywhere. At Ericsson we truly understand how new standards and industry technologies should best be implemented and applied to benefit both the operator and consumer. That is why we’ve responded by pioneering another first in adopting and implementing HEVC specifically for mobile use.”

HEVC is the latest video coding standards activity, developed by the Joint Collaborative Team-Video Coding (JCT-VC), a collaborative project between the ITU-T Video Coding Experts Group (VCEG) and the ISO/IECE Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG). It was issued as a Draft International Standard in July 2012. Final Draft International Standard (FDIS) is due January 2013, which is the start of formal ratification.