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Rapid Deployment of Wi-Fi/DAB Radio Module

London, 15th October, 2007: Frontier Silicon has secured over ten design wins to date for its Venice 6 Wi-Fi radio solution with leading brands including Roberts Radio and Grundig, marking a significant entry into the emerging stand-alone Internet radio receiver market. Designs using the module include portable and alarm clock radios, CD micro systems, and HiFi tuners, and are expected in the shops by November 2007.

Anthony Sethill, CEO, Frontier Silicon commented: “This year we have expanded our audio business into the emerging Wi-Fi/Internet radio arena and have led the industry in introducing Venice 6, which is the only complete module for Wi-Fi/DAB/DAB+/FM available on the market today. Already over 72 million people in the US alone listen to the radio using the Internet, mainly through their PC, so the prospects for stand-alone Wi-Fi radios are extremely positive.”
Venice 6 is the world’s first digital receiver module capable of receiving Internet radio via Wi-Fi, DAB/DAB+, FM and music streamed from a network server. Based around Frontier Silicon’s powerful Chorus 2i processor, it streams radio stations and music files in a variety of formats and protocols including MP3, Windows Media Audio (WMA), and Real Audio. Venice 6 can access over 15 000 Internet radio stations and podcasts with just a few key presses. Each end-user radio is also configurable through the Frontier Silicon/vTuner web portal which manages all available stations to ensure quality and reliability of content.

Latest enhancements to Venice 6 include the availability of multi-language support and the addition of UPnP (Universal Plug and Play) enabling standardized compatibility for music streaming from PCs. The module has Internet Software Upgrade (ISU) functionality, allowing firmware to be easily updated over Wi-Fi, ensuring ‘future-proofed’ radios.

Venice 6 is supported by a range of platforms including Jupiter 6, a fully-qualified reference design providing a flexible architecture for OEMs to use either as-is, modified or as a starting point to speed development of custom products. Jupiter 6 incorporates iPod docking functionality which enables playback, control and charging of the iPod.
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Editor's note:

About Digital Broadcasting

DAB: Digital Radio standard Eureka 147 using MPEG Audio Layer 2 as standard audio codec.
DMB: DAB based application for mobile TV.
DAB+: Digital Radio DAB using MPEG-4 HE-AAC v2 as audio codec.

Trademarks

Apple, the Apple logo, iPod and iTunes are trademarks of Apple Computer, Inc. Frontier Silicon uses Meta™ and UCC™ intellectual property from Imagination Technologies. Other company and product names may be trademarks of their respective owners.

About Frontier Silicon Limited

Frontier Silicon is the leading supplier of digital and RF integrated circuits and modules for mobile digital TV and digital audio products. Established in 2001 as a privately funded fabless semiconductor company, it has over 200 employees and is headquartered in Watford, England, with design centres in Cambridge and Dublin, and branch offices and technical support representatives in Hong Kong, China, Korea and Japan. Products include audio processors for digital radio and network streaming, and receiver solutions for mobile TV, supporting multiple broadcast standards including DVB-H, DVB-T, T-DMB and DAB-IP.

Customers include Samsung, Sharp, Sony, Bang & Olufsen, Bush, Denon, Goodmans, Grundig, Hitachi, JVC, Onkyo, Philips, PURE Digital, ROBERTS, Sanyo, TEAC and Yamaha.

For more information, visit www.frontier-silicon.com.

Contact details:
Jonathan Colbourne, Marketing and PR manager.
Tel: +44 (0) 1923 474220
Email: press@frontier-silicon.com