Seven leading consumer electronics and technology companies have announced the formation of a new company in Japan that enables cable television system operators to deliver enhanced video on demand and interactive TV services to subscribers.

Based in Tokyo, the joint venture, eBox Corporation comprises Pioneer Corporation, Sharp Corporation, National Semiconductor Corporation, Sigma Designs and CMC Magnetics, according to an official release.

Targeting North American and Asia-Pacific cable operators, the joint venture partners will deliver a complete infrastructure that includes head-end equipment, system software, content-protection systems and digital set-top boxes to provide scheduled and on-demand MPEG-4 encoded content and interactive services.

Comcast Cable Communications which claims to be the third largest cable company in the US, is advising the joint venture partners on the technical requirements of the system and intends to conduct field trials of the new services early next year.

The joint venture has developed a new digital cable solution, based on MPEG-4 technology, that enables new services for consumers, the release states. These new services include video-on-demand with the look and feel of interactive DVD, e-commerce, bandwidth-efficient delivery of high definition television, and high-capacity personal video recording (PVR). The consortium's technology also provides stand-alone benefits for cable operators seeking an economical transition to next-generation entertainment services. Cable companies will not have to replace their existing digital cable infrastructure to take advantage of the compression efficiency, content protection and other enhanced capabilities of the consortium's new MPEG-4 system architecture.

Pioneer and Sharp will contribute their knowledge of cable infrastructures, head-end equipment and digital set-top boxes to support the new system. National Semiconductor will provide silicon processors for the advanced set-top boxes based on its Geode technology. Sigma Designs will provide MPEG-4 decoder and video processing technologies for the advanced set-top boxes. CMC Magnetics will provide manufacturing expertise for the design and development of head-end equipment and set-top boxes. iVAST will provide the encoding, authoring, distribution, playback and system software for MPEG-4 based movie and video entertainment content with embedded interactive features. Modern VideoFilm will provide post-production services and MPEG-4 compression and authoring.

In addition, the company will provide the hub for the various "Movie on Demand" and other MPEG-4 encoded entertainment content that will be offered by the new platform. Comcast will provide technical support to define the architectural requirements and conduct field trials on the initial production systems early next year.

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