ASIA : Sasken announced the launch and availability of its Strawberra™ range of multimedia applications and codecs, which includes the Videophone terminal, Media application suite and the MMS client.

The launch of Strawberra™ brings together, for the first time, a proven range of multimedia applications and codecs, which has achieved standards compliance and has been deployed by a number of the world’s leading wireless device manufacturers and mobile platform vendors.

“The availability of the Strawberra™ multimedia applications and codecs range enables device manufacturers to drive time and cost out of the development lifecycle for new products,” explains Colin Aitken, Vice President of Marketing at Sasken. Constant pressures on handset vendors to bring new & differentiated handsets to market make the option of seeking external vendors, more attractive.”

“In offering a comprehensive range of proven integrated multimedia applications and codecs, Sasken is removing the need for manufacturers to develop these solutions in-house, allowing internal resources to be deployed in other areas. Additionally, the ready availability of a tested and compliant Strawberra™ range means that these manufacturers know that they can significantly cut their time-to-market.”

Use of components from the Strawberra™ range can also offer manufacturers to differentiate their products within the market. For example, the presence of the advanced 3G-324M Videophone Terminal can effortlessly be deployed on wireless and landline networks, enabling real-time, two-way voice and video communication. Its features include support for MPEG-4 video, AMR and G.723.1 speech, plus H.223, H.245 and H.324M protocols.

The media application suite in Strawberra™ helps to eliminate the need for multiple devices by including audio player, video player, image capture and display, plus video capture and display. The MMS client manages all of the required elements of MMS messaging, but has also been designed to incorporate future extensions, making it easy for manufacturers to keep pace with developing technologies.

The current Strawberra™ range is complete with the availability of a range of video, audio, speech and image codecs, which provide building blocks to enable the creation of compelling, revenue-generating applications.

Currently optimised for the OMAP™ series of platforms of Texas Instruments the Strawberra™ range will soon be extended to other platforms.

The Strawberra™ Videophone terminal will be demonstrated at Embedded Technology 2003, in Yokohama, Japan (12-14 November 2003).