Hitachi and The Fantastic Corporation announce Partnership to develop Direct-to-Home Multimedia Broadcasting Service
Tokyo (Japan), October 26 2000 - Hitachi, Ltd (TSE:6501/NYSE:HIT), one of the world`s largest electronics companies and The Fantastic Corporation, a global leader in broadband multimedia, announced today that they have agreed to co-develop a Direct-to-Home Multimedia Broadcasting Service over satellite for Asia Pacific.
Under the terms of agreement, both companies will co-operate to study and develop new exciting media services for today`s sophisticated and Internet-savvy consumers by first initiating a feasibility study. Fantastic will license its broadband content distribution and management software to Hitachi to enable the distribution of the content, and will also provide consultation and media expertise to determine the effective usage of broadband technologies and multimedia content. Hitachi will provide the hardware, facilities and will also engage in a range of initiatives in the media and entertainment industry for content aggregation and distribution.
This multimedia broadcasting service aims to deliver all categories of mass market digital multimedia content effectively and quickly to Internet enabled devices such as PCs, home appliances and set-top boxes. Using broadcasting technology, Fantastic`s software will enable consumers to receive an enhanced media experience that combines entertainment, interactivity, shopping, personalized content and fun. The content can be broadcast daily, weekly or on an as needed basis through audio/video streaming, package delivery or cache delivery.
"We are very excited about this collaboration with Fantastic and its high quality Broadband multimedia broadcasting technology. Hitachi will develop businesses such as the management of responses with interactive systems, efficient ways to provide content, TV-commerce including auctions and so on. Fantastic`s management system for broadcasting is a very good fit as a basis for our services," said Kimitoshi Yamada, General Manager of e-Service & Business Development Hitachi, Ltd.
"The next evolution in the media scene is about to explode with new forms of interactive entertainment that tailors to individual consumer`s lifestyles, convenience and interests -free from the limitations of bandwidth. Just like the Internet has fundamentally changed how we communicate globally, we are about to witness another mega communication wave with Broadband," said Mr. Tsuneo Sakai, President of Fantastic Japan. "We are pleased to be working with Hitachi to stimulate this new wave of innovation with media and e-commerce services that takes the best of television and Internet - an enriched service that consumers can soon experience anytime, anywhere."
This announcement follows a series of successful broadband pilots that Fantastic has already conducted globally. One of these recent pilots is done with Telstra in Australia, where Broadband channels containing games, news, advertisements and live video streaming were constantly broadcast via satellite to PCs at selected customer sites throughout Australia over a two-month period. Another pilot was conducted with mobile phone leader Nokia, showing handheld devices, successfully receiving multimedia content at speeds of 14.95 megabits per second - enough to support several simultaneous TV quality video streams in the palm of the user`s hand. These pilots were based on unidirectional Broadband content delivery with dial back options.
The partners expect that the first services will be available to the consumers in the second half of 2001.
Hitachi, Ltd., headquartered in Tokyo, Japan, is one of the world`s leading global electronics companies, with fiscal 1999 (ended March 31, 2000) consolidated sales of 8,001 billion yen ($75.5 billion*). The company manufactures and markets a wide range of products, including computers, semiconductors, consumer products and power and industrial equipment. For more information on Hitachi, Ltd., please visit Hitachi`s Web site at www.hitachi.co.jp At an exchange rate of 106 yen to the dollar.
The Fantastic Corporation (Zug, Switzerland) is the leading provider of software solutions for data broadcasting. This is an emerging communications technology which combines point-to-multipoint digital broadcasting with point-to-point Internet connectivity, in order to deliver rich interactive media content to PCs, digital set-top boxes or handheld devices (including 3G mobile phones) over any broadband IP network.
By merging the inherent bandwidth and speed benefits of broadcasting technologies with the interactivity of the Internet, data broadcast provides superior content distribution and interaction in an increasingly IP-centric world. Fantastic`s end-to-end software supports the rapid growth of the "data broadcast" industry.
Fantastic`s global partners and customers include BT plc, Telecom Italia, Deutsche Telekom, Loral Space and Communications, Reuters, Lucent Technologies, Intel, Singapore Press Holdings and Inktomi. Fantastic is a public company, quoted on the Frankfurt Stock exchange using the symbol: FAN
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