The industry’s smallest audio reproduction system is how Rohm Semiconductor describes its BU9438KV device, debuted at CEATEC Japan for car, portable and home audio uses. Rohm has started sample shipments of the BU9438KV, which builds USB and SD memory card audio playback functionality into a single chip, the company said. The device also sports USB 2.0 and SD host controllers and MP3, WMA9 and AAC decoders, Rohm said. Engineers at Rohm’s CEATEC stand wouldn’t discuss pricing.
Paul Gluckman
Paul Gluckman, Executive Senior Editor, is a 30-year Warren Communications News veteran having joined the company in May 1989 to launch its Audio Week publication. In his long career, Paul has chronicled the rise and fall of physical entertainment media like the CD, DVD and Blu-ray and the advent of ATSC 3.0 broadcast technology from its rudimentary standardization roots to its anticipated 2020 commercial launch.
A MOD Systems countersuit accusing consultant and former Warner Home Video President Warren Lieberfarb of breach of contract is in the works, MOD attorney Randall Beighle told Consumer Electronics Daily in an e-mail Friday. MOD Systems, just landed significant financing from Toshiba to launch on- demand delivery of music and video content to SD memory cards (CED Sept 18 p1). Lieberfarb sued MOD Sept. 4 in U.S. District Court, Seattle, seeking almost $730,000 in claimed unpaid fees and expenses for bringing MOD and Toshiba together. He’s a shareholder in privately held MOD, his suit said, without specifying his holdings. Lieberfarb’s suit said he has resigned from the MOD board and in negotiations with Toshiba the company misrepresented him as still consulting for the company. But MOD “parted ways” with Lieberfarb and did so “for good reason,” Beighle said, promising that details will emerge in court. “We think Mr. Lieberfarb’s lawsuit is misguided and incorrect, and MOD Systems looks forward to completing the lawsuit and expects to prevail in the litigation,” Beighle said. Lieberfarb didn’t respond to our requests for comment and his attorney, Michael Bolasina, declined to comment.
Phil Schoonover’s embattled two-year reign as Circuit City CEO, president and chairman ended late Monday when the chain announced that he has “agreed to step down from those positions,” effective immediately. Schoonover also resigned from the Circuit City board, apparently severing all ties to the company.
Residents of nursing homes and intermediate-care and assisted-living facilities will be able to apply for one converter box coupon under new program rules taking effect Oct. 20, the NTIA said in a Federal Register notice published Friday. The rules will also make people who get their mail at post-office boxes eligible for coupons, but they must “provide an actual physical address location along with their post office box number” so the NTIA can verify the address, the agency said.
The CE Retailers Coalition “does not allow, facilitate or abide by discussions of price among its members, period,” Bob Schwartz, the group’s general counsel, told Consumer Electronics Daily. On Monday FCC Chairman Kevin Martin wrote CERC Executive Director Christopher McLean asking the group to lean on members to stock and sell DTV converters with analog passthrough capability for $40, the federal coupon’s value (CED Sept 16 p7). Consumers Union Senior Counsel Chris Murray urged the House telecom subcommittee at a Tuesday hearing to probe why more $40 EchoStar boxes aren’t available and to “use its bully pulpit to ensure that consumers aren’t falling prey to DTV profiteering.” Questioned by subcommittee Chairman Edward Markey, D-Mass., McLean said that “as a coalition of competitors, we cannot do any kind of coordination on price or product, so each one of our members is making individual decisions” about which boxes to carry and for how much. With release of the FCC letter, “every one of our members is aware of Chairman Martin’s request about the $40 box,” McLean said. Markey asked if temporary antitrust exemptions would encourage retailers to coordinate plans. “We certainly under the current law cannot coordinate price, product selection, in terms of sales,” McLean answered. “That’s absolutely prohibited on a coordinated basis.”
Toshiba and NCR will invest $35 million in MOD Systems and become minority stakeholders in the digital downloads service supplier, the companies said Thursday. They called the outlay part of a “bold initiative” to launch digital downloads of music and standard-definition movie content to SD memory cards and portable devices. They declined to say when the service will debut.
HOLLYWOOD -- Coupon-eligible converter boxes “are definitely a finite product,” John Taylor, LG vice president for public affairs and communications, told the DisplaySearch HDTV Conference here Wednesday. “It'll last for many years, but it won’t be on the market forever,” Taylor said.
HOLLYWOOD -- Industry naysayers “buried DVD long before it was time and it’s not going to be time for years,” Danny Kaye, Fox Home Entertainment senior vice president of business development, told the DisplaySearch HDTV Conference Tuesday.
NTIA needs to tell Congress why it’s asking Congress to approve $7 million for distributing more converter coupons, Democratic leaders of the House Commerce Committee said Monday in a letter to Meredith Baker, NTIA’s acting administrator. The NTIA thinks it can distribute 16.5 million extra converter box coupons, making the total more than 50 million, through March 31, it said. The additional 1.6 million coupons would be financed with money reclaimed from expired vouchers. And the NTIA still would be able to return $340 million from unused coupons to the treasury, Commerce Department General Counsel Lily Claffee told Hill leaders in a Thursday letter. She proposed legislation that would authorize the NTIA to use up to $7 million in administrative funds from its other programs under the DTV Transition and Public Safety Act. The money would give the NTIA “flexibility so that it could continue to distribute coupons to eligible U.S. households to meet additional consumer demand through the end of the converter box program,” Claffee said. Acting NTIA administrator Meredith Baker is expected to make the same case in Tuesday testimony to the House Telecom Subcommittee (CED Sept 15 p8). The NTIA based its estimate that it could distribute over 50 million coupons by March 31 -- the last day consumers can ask for them -- on the coupon program’s “current system processing capacity,” Claffee said. The NTIA contractor, IBM, has said it can process 4.5 million coupon requests a month. As of Saturday coupon requests were averaging about 110,000 a day, Claffee said. The estimate assumes that coupon orders will spike as the DTV transition nears and that today’s 49 percent redemption rate “will remain constant,” she said. Congress would have to pass a law for NTIA to get the $7 million it says it needs for administrative expenses. Draft legislation was submitted Monday to Congress. NTIA didn’t tell Congress it would need this help in a July letter, Commerce Committee Chairman John Dingell, D-Mich., and Telecom Subcommittee Chairman Ed Markey, D-Mass., said in a Monday letter of their own. They asked NTIA when it expects to run out of administrative money if Congress doesn’t act. They also asked NTIA how many coupons $7 million would pay for. A response is due Friday.
Three CE makers agreed to pay the FCC $78,350 in fines total for shipping TV sets without DTV tuners, the agency said in consent decree orders released Friday. It said ViewSonic agreed to pay $23,350, Sling Media $42,500 and TTE $12,500. Consent decrees require the companies to compliance measures, such as certifying that TV shipments obey the commission’s DTV tuner mandate, the orders said. TTE agreed to a requirement not imposed on the others. “Specifically, only digital television broadcast receivers for United States customers will have pricing data associated with them, ensuring that no United States customer will be able to purchase a noncompliant new television broadcast receiver,” the order on TTE said. TTE, which sells RCA-brand TVs, also agreed to replace with digital sets analog-only sets still under warranty, the order said. The company is doing that to smooth the DTV transition and minimize “consumer confusion or disruption,” the order said.