Pace Micro Technology Plc, the UK-based digital set-top box manufacturer, is to co-develop integrated digital televisions with a number of leading consumer electronics manufacturers. The televisions will incorporate Pace’s pay TV technology which supports digital TV services from both BSkyB and OnDigital (formerly BDB). Integrated digital TVs incorporate a receiver/decoder inside the television cabinet, rather than as a separate set-top box. The first company to sign a collaboration agreement is Korean electronic giant LG which will integrate Pace’s pay TV technology into wide screen digital TV sets due out in time for Christmas 1998. Pace says that it is in advanced negotiations with Toshiba for the rapid supply of BSkyB set-top boxes and to develop BSkyB integrated digital TVs for launch in mid-1999. Last week, Pace won an order from Cable & Wireless Communications for 100,000 digital cable set-top boxes. In a separate move, Pace says it is developing an internet-enabled set-top box for launch by the end of 1998. It claims to be the first vendor to apply for approval from BABT, the UK telecommunications equipment standards authority, to integrate an analog modem in its TV set-top boxes. BABT has just applied the new CTR21 European standard for analog modems to satellite TV set-top boxes. This means that it will be able to award pan-European approval to UK-based vendors integrating modems into their set-top boxes, freeing them from the need to gain country-by-country approval.
