SGS-Thomson Microelectronics and Lucent Technologies' Microelectronics Division each used the cable industry's Western Show last week to claim "firsts" in highest chip integration for set-top boxes and cable modems.

ST unveiled a single-chip back-end chip for set-tops that it said will cut costs one-third over current three-chip sets used in cable boxes. The ST chip integrates the 32-bit ST-20 microprocessor core, a transport controller, ST's MPEG-2 video and audio decoder, and a TV picture encoder.

The device, scheduled for production in the second quarter next year, will cost about $35 in quantity, compared with $50 for three-chip sets, the company said.

John Rossi, manager of consumer market development, said ST wanted to be first to market with the single-chip back end for set-tops to protect its 71% global market share in MPEG-2 chips.

With only minor changes, the ST back-end chip can be used in set-top boxes for DBS receivers, a market in which SGS-Thomson participates along with its partner, Thomson Consumer Electronics division, which makes the boxes.

Cutting the cost of silicon also spurred Lucent Technologies to jump into the cable-modem market for the first time, with a single-chip front-end demodulator, also claimed to be first in the industry.

The Lucent chip integrates 256-quadrature amplitude modulation, an A/D converter, an intermediate frequency bandpass converter, and forward error correction.

A separate RF chip integrates the transmitter, transmit/receive data converters, Ethernet controller, and encryption. The two-chip solution replaces nine separate chips in most current cable modems, cutting chip costs to $49 from the present $98, said Jay Kshatri, Lucent's manager of consumer digital video.

Lucent is working toward a single-chip, mixed-signal version that could be available in 1999, Kshatri said.

Source: Electronic Buyers' News