MIPS Architecture Leading the HDTV Revolution

Dominance of MIPS Architecture in STB Market Lays Foundation for Leadership in DTV and Emerging IDTV Markets

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., April 19, 2004 - If you live in one of the millions of households around the world which enjoys the benefits of viewing high-definition television (HDTV), you most likely own a MIPS-Based™ system.

HDTV systems transform the way we experience entertainment. By delivering crystal clear video, high-fidelity surround sound, full screen graphics and the ability to drive interactive applications, HDTVs offer an immersive user experience that is attracting consumers the world over. Factors such as evolving standards, advances in digital broadcasting and display technology, and government mandates around the world, like the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) requirements that digital tuners be included in all televisions and that analog broadcasting cease by 2007, are fueling this revolution. In 2008, In-Stat/MDR analysts estimate that 93 million DTV units will ship worldwide-up from 17 million units in 2004.

MIPS Technologies, Inc. (Nasdaq: MIPS), a Silicon Valley-based company whose intellectual property (IP) solution enables many of the world's most popular digital consumer and business applications, is at the forefront of this HDTV revolution. The world's leading developers and manufacturers of sophisticated audio and visual consumer products, such as JVC, Pioneer, Samsung, and Sony, are currently designing and shipping HDTVs with MIPS-Based silicon solutions from licensees of MIPS Technologies such as ATI, Micronas, Genesis Microchip, Philips Semiconductors, NEC, Toshiba, and Zoran Corporation, to Europe, Japan, the United States, and Taiwan.

HDTV systems include both high-definition "ready" digital televisions (DTVs), which rely on set-top boxes (STBs) as external decoders of digital signals, as well as integrated digital televisions (IDTVs), which integrate digital tuners, demodulators, and source decoders into a television with advanced digital display (LCD, plasma, rear-projection, or CRT). Because the MIPS® architecture is the de facto standard for STBs, utilized in close to 50 percent of all digital STBs, there is a natural migration of MIPS-Based solutions into the HDTV market. Building on this foundation, with 40 percent of the DTV market already employing MIPS-Based solutions, the MIPS architecture is positioned to gain share in the emerging IDTV market as well.

"Over 17 million units of DTVs will be shipped worldwide in 2004 and indicators-including government mandates, evolving standards, consumer demand, and increasing numbers of digital broadcast services-point toward continued strong growth going forward," said Michelle Abraham, senior analyst at In-Stat/MDR. "The MIPS architecture has clearly emerged as the leader in the HDTV market. Its inherent performance capabilities, programmable features, and well-established foundation of optimized software and middleware for digital TV allow OEMs to offer HDTVs with richer functionality at desirable cost points."

MIPS-Based processors and innovative software solutions drive system design for HDTV products throughout the entire industry. From ultra low cost set-top boxes to advanced personal digital video recorders, MIPS-Based processors enable new services, content and functionality, while reducing system cost. For DTV and IDTV systems-on-a-chip (SOCs), MIPS Technologies offers synthesizable and highly programmable cores with user-defined instruction capabilities and optimized software-a great benefit in these cost sensitive markets. Because of MIPS long standing position as the default solution in the STB space, the architecture is well supported by a large body of experienced software engineers who have written a wide spectrum of operating systems, middleware, applications, program guides, Java and audio solutions. Ultimately, these benefits are realized in significantly minimized development costs and efficient time-to-market.

"The MIPS architecture has long been the solution of choice for leaders in the set-top box market. These same leaders are continuing to choose MIPS as they move into the HDTV space. Our families of 32- and 64-bit cores, along with a number of MIPS-Based solutions from our licensees, offer SOC designers in this market unsurpassed solutions," stated Jack Browne, vice president of worldwide sales at MIPS Technologies. "The unparalleled performance and configurability options offered by MIPS, together with the optimized applications and development environment, will continue to promote both cost-effective and feature-rich HDTV solutions from which consumers worldwide will benefit."

Whatever the product- DTV or IDTV-the choice is clear: MIPS-Based HDTV solutions lead the way. The following companies are utilizing MIPS-Based HDTV solutions:

• JVC (Victor/JVC): I'Art PRO Rear-projection TV
  
• Pioneer: PureVision HDTV (43", 50") Plasma TV
  
• Sony
  • XBR® Plasma WEGA™ HDTV (42", 50", 61")
    
  • VEGA KDE-P42HZ1 (Plasma TV)
    
  • KD-32NS100 MHP-Based IDTV
    
  • KDP-51, 57, 65 WS550 Series (Digital TV)
• Xiamen Overseas Chinese Electronic Co., Ltd. (XOCECO): DH-78 HDTV Cable STB
  
• And models from Changhong, Funai, Hisense Electric Co. Ltd., and Samsung

Select MIPS Technologies Licensees Driving Technology into the HDTV Markets:
As the HDTV market matures more functionality and performance will be demanded from the silicon powering the application. Going forward, as more DTVs become IDTVs, the silicon will need to accommodate an integrated digital tuner, demodulator, and MPEG-processors as well as legacy analog decoders and Dolby® decoders. High performance and system flexibility, critical factors for success in this market, are available from both new and established MIPS Technologies licensees in their MIPS-Based silicon solutions for the HDTV market.

ATI
The MIPS-Based XILLEON™ 220 is an advanced and highly integrated system-on-chip suitable for a range of digital devices including set-top boxes, digital TVs, home media gateways, and TV-enabled webpads. Its groundbreaking design integrates a high speed MIPS CPU, graphics, video, audio, conditional access, USB, EIDE, PCI, memory controller, and a host of other I/O capabilities. To complete the design of many consumer devices, the only components that need to be added are tuners, demodulators, modems, and memory.

Genesis Microchip
The MIPS32® 4KEc™ core was licensed by Genesis Microchip, a leading provider of image processing systems enabling superior picture quality in LCD TVs, to be used in its digital TV product offering. Featuring Genesis Display Perfection™ technologies and Emmy award-winning Faroudja® video technology, Genesis system-on-a-chip solutions are used worldwide by display manufacturers to produce visibly better images across a broad array of devices including flat panel displays, digital TVs, projectors and DVD players/recorders.

Micronas
Micronas, a leading provider of ICs for consumer electronics, multimedia and automotive applications, wanted to offer future-proof, high-performance, low-power designs for home entertainment platforms. The company chose MIPS Technologies' 32-bit core intellectual property for its new product development, which includes digital TV solutions.

NEC
NEC has created two generations of the EMMArchitecture, which utilizes cores from the MIPS32 4K® family, an MPEG A/V decompression engine, graphics bit BLT/ display engine, stream processing engine and other peripherals on single chip LSI, together with a unified memory bus design. The EMMArchitecture has successfully been designed into a wide range of digital consumer products: from low-end volume applications to mid/high-end STB/ DTV applications such as Personal Video Recorders and wireless IP STBs, and most recently, into DVD/ HDD combo recorder applications.

Philips Semiconductors
The highly integrated Nexperia™ Home Entertainment Engines implement the MIPS architecture and handle all key source decoding and media processing functions in TV-centric products such as analog, analog/digital, and digital TV sets and receivers, connected digital TVs, home multimedia servers, and home entertainment centers.

Zoran Corporation
Zoran Corp., a leading supplier of high-performance digital solutions-on-a-chip in the consumer electronics markets, is using the MIPS architecture as the basis for all of its DTV solutions. These MIPS-Based solutions include the SupraTV™ 140, SupraTV™151, the Generation9™ family of Integrated DTV System ICs, software, and development platforms, and the Cougar-G9 development platform.

About MIPS Technologies
MIPS Technologies, Inc. is a leading provider of industry-standard processor architectures and cores for digital consumer and business applications. The company drives the broadest architectural alliance that is delivering 32- and 64-bit embedded RISC solutions. The company licenses its intellectual property to semiconductor companies, ASIC developers, and system OEMs. MIPS Technologies and its licensees offer the widest range of robust, scalable processors in standard, custom, semi-custom and application-specific products. The company is based in Mountain View, Calif., and can be reached at +1 (650) 567-5000 or www.mips.com.