Celeno Enables Cable HD IPTV Wireless Distribution throughout the Home

Celeno CL1300 interoperates with Texas Instruments’ Puma 5 family of DOCSIS 3.0® products to enable next-generation cable modem gateways

RA’ANANA, Israel — Celeno Communications, a leading provider of semiconductors for multimedia Wi-Fi home networking applications, today announced that it is working with Texas Instruments (NYSE: TXN) to enable next-generation cable modem gateways with wireless HD technology for Cable HD IPTV applications. Celeno’s high-performance CL1300 Wi Fi chip is now interoperable with Texas Instruments’ (TI) Puma 5 family of DOCSIS 3.0® products. The joint technology enables MSOs (Multiple Service Operators) to address next generation Cable IPTV whole-home distribution requirements and multi-room DVR use cases with robust, wireless HD home networking. Cable MSOs can benefit from the advantages of HD Wi-Fi such as: flexibility to address STB’s in coax-less rooms, video distribution to devices beyond STB’s (e.g., portable devices and personal computers), and reduction of installation expenditures.

A DOCSIS 3.0 transport gateway manages the conversion of legacy MPEG2 streams to IP, in addition to handling next-generation IPTV streams. When deployed with a hard drive, it can support multi-room DVR service and share stored content throughout the home network. This delivery architecture leverages Celeno’s wireless HD technology to reliably and efficiently stream video content throughout the home to multiple tuner-less thin IP STB’s, laptops and portable media devices for place-, time- and device-shifting use cases.

“We expect worldwide wideband cable subscribers to reach 22.5 million by close of year 2013. There’s no question that DOCSIS 3.0 is a key strategic driver for MSOs around the world”, said Jeff Heynen, Directing Analyst at Infonetics Research. “Marrying its capabilities with robust Wi-Fi technology for HD video distribution will allow MSOs to deliver video streams to portable devices as well as cost-effectively deploy IPTV services in those homes and rooms lacking coax infrastructure.”

Wireless HD home networking is now a viable solution for MSOs, thanks to the video quality and reach achieved by Celeno’s CL1300 chip-level solution, which can be integrated into a cable gateway device. The Celeno solution is the first field proven Implicit Phased-array Transmit Beamforming MIMO (multiple-input and multiple-output) chip to achieve HD performance with full backwards and future compatibility with any third party Wi-Fi client on the receiving STB side. It represents the latest advancements in Wi-Fi HD video performance by optimizing Beamforming with smart antenna diversity and full real time channel tracking for accurate rate and power management. The CL1300 achieves whole-home coverage with throughput for multiple HD video streams with no packet loss and optimal interference immunity. Together with TI’s Puma 5 family, the integrated offering meets MSOs’ stringent requirements for wire-like video quality and performance.

This complete solution benefits Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEM) designing next- generation cable modems and transport gateways with a full development kit for fast time to market. The two solutions are integrated via MII/RMII interfaces, requiring little to no software integration. Additionally, the joint solution includes a consolidated SNMP management interface to simplify the management architecture.

“TI’s Puma 5 family of DOCSIS 3.0 products enable OEMs to develop a broad portfolio of innovative cable modem, EMTA and gateway products that will change the way consumers access and transport content throughout their home”, said Adam Lapede, director of marketing, TI’s digital connected home group. “As part of TI’s growing DOCSIS 3.0 ecosystem, Celeno has combined the flexibility of Puma 5 with its wireless HD home networking solutions allowing OEMs to offer IPTV distribution and multi-room DVR capabilities.”

“This joint-effort with TI, a leader in the cable modem chip market, will enable our customers to quickly integrate and build successful next generation gateways for the cable market”, said Lior Weiss, VP Marketing at Celeno, “Our customers are telling us that the combination of IP DOCSIS 3.0 and wireless HD home networking is a paradigm shift in how video is delivered in the home. With the CL1300 and its cross-layer optimization for video distribution, Celeno is uniquely positioned to provide OEMs with the most advanced, cost-effective Wi-Fi chip solution for this market.”