Alcatel Network Systems and Nuko Information Systems Inc of San Jose, California have a memorandum of understanding to deliver a series of new MPEG-2 video services, with better picture quality than existing cable television or direct broadcast satellite, over the telephone network infrastructure. This collaboration will mean the debut of the MPEG 2 transport and screen management protocols in the North American telecommunications network. Under terms of the memorandum, carriers picking Alcatel’s Switched Digital Video Network services system will have access to both Nuko’s MPEG-2 digital video encoder and decoder technology and Alcatel’s 1000 AX Asynchronous Transfer Mode video multiplex and router technology for the management of video and mult imedia transmission, storage, multi-queuing and multi-access distribution. Activities undertaken by Alcatel and Nuko over the last several months will culminate this quarter with a commercial service market trial of distance learning and television trunking using the Asynchronous Mode switching, store and forward, and MPEG-2 technologies, the companies announced proudly. Alcatel and Nuko are designing this MPEG-2-based service to integrate with fibre optic synchronous optical network, Asynchronous Transfer Mode and high-capacity copper and coax facilities. Alcatel and Nuko will jointly develop a series of carrier services that will enable the digital transmission of video at quality levels that can be determined by the carrier’s customers. The addition of MPEG-2 capability will enable Alcatel to provide a complete line of video and multimedia products and support services for carriers.
