NEC Electronics Launches Industry's First High-Quality, One Chip Video Decoder

KAWASAKI, Japan, SANTA CLARA, Calif., DUESSELDORF, Germany, September 17, 2004 – NEC Electronics Corporation (TSE: 6723) and its subsidiaries in Europe and the United States, NEC Electronics (Europe) GmbH and NEC Electronics America, Inc., today introduced the µPD64012 video decoder, the industry's first system large-scale integration (LSI) device to integrate five main video processing functions onto a single chip. In the highly competitive consumer electronics market, size, cost, and time to market are key factors in a product's success. With its main functions, including three-dimensional (3D) noise reduction and 3D luminance/chrominance (Y/C) separation, integrated onto a single chip in miniaturized form, the µPD64012 chip enables design engineers to reduce a design's footprint by approximately 50 percent, system component costs by approximately 30 percent and the necessary large-scale integration time, thereby speeding time to market and lowering system costs.

"The growth of digital consumer products in recent years has resulted in a rapid increase in the demand for AV equipment capable of handling high-quality images, traditionally accomplished by using multiple LSI chips to provide all the necessary video decoder functions," said Masao Hirasawa, general manager, Digital Audio/Visual Systems Division, NEC Electronics Corporation. "By delivering a video decoder solution with a high level of integration, NEC Electronics is providing customers with the semiconductor solution they need to produce high-performance digital AV devices at prices attractive to the consumer."

Video decoders enable the use of analog TV broadcasting in digital home devices such as liquid crystal display (LCD) televisions (TVs), plasma TVs, DVD recorders, set-top boxes (STBs) and video-capture cards for PCs. Until now, designers have had to use a combination of LSI chips to achieve the required functions, resulting in a number of challenges including large board sizes, that made the creation of small products difficult; a large number of components that resulted in higher costs; and a lengthy LSI connection process that increased the time to market.

Using leading-edge circuit technology and a unified memory technology that allows the consolidation of multiple discrete external memory devices into one memory device, the µPD64012 LSI chip incorporates the following five functions:

• Video decoder that converts analog video signals into high-quality digital video signals
• 3D noise reducer that removes the noise in analog video signals and eliminates image flicker
• Anti-alias filter that eliminates noise exceeding the video signal bandwidth
• 3DY/C separator that accurately separates the luminance and chrominance in NTSC signals to reduce dot-crawl and cross-color artifacts and enable high-quality video capturing
• Support for all the major analog signal interface standards, including the SCART system used in Europe; the S system used in Japan; the component and composite systems used worldwide; PAL and SECAM, major TV broadcast signal standards used in Europe; and NTSC used in Japan and the U.S.

The µPD64012 chip enables higher image quality for consumer products such as flat panel TVs by simultaneously applying 3DY/C separation and 3D noise reduction to analog video signals and by offering a direct connection to the µPD64031A chip, an NEC Electronics LSI device that reduces ghosting in Japan's terrestrial analog broadcast signals, to enhance image quality. The µPD64012 chip also digitizes progressive signals to achieve smooth images with little flicker from high-image quality DVD players.

Pricing and Availability
Samples of the µPD64012 chip are available now and will be priced at US$30 per unit. Mass production is scheduled to begin in December 2004 with a planned production of 500,000 units per month. Pricing and availability are subject to change.

About NEC Electronics America, Inc.
NEC Electronics Corporation (TSE: 6723) specializes in semiconductor products encompassing advanced technology solutions for the high-end computing and broadband networking markets, system solutions for the mobile handsets, PC peripherals, automotive and digital consumer markets, and platform solutions for a wide range of customer applications. NEC Electronics Corporation has 26 subsidiaries worldwide including NEC Electronics America, Inc. and NEC Electronics (Europe) GmbH. In addition to marketing, selling and supporting NEC Electronics products to customers in their respective regions, NEC Electronics America and NEC Electronics Europe also operate local manufacturing facilities in Roseville, California, and Ballivor, Ireland, respectively. Additionally, NEC Electronics America for North America and NEC Electronics Europe for Europe are the sales and marketing channels of NEC active-matrix LCD modules from NEC LCD Technologies, Ltd., a global leader in innovative display technologies. For additional information about NEC Electronics worldwide, visit www.necel.com.