Silicon Wave Claims First Silicon Tuner forthe Cable Telephony Market

Electronic News, Dec 4, 2000

SILICON WAVE INC. HAS DEVELOPED WHAT IT claims is the first fully integrated, ultralowpower downstream silicon tuner for the cable telephony market. The IC, dubbed the Sentinel SiW1100, has been designed to allow cable operators to compete with telephone services, the San Diego-based company said.

The SiW1100 uses less than 600mW in full operation, offering the lowest known power consumption available for cable front-end receivers, according to the company. The module can also be used in outdoor temperatures ranging from minus 40 degrees Celsius to plus 80 degrees Celsius, enabling the tuner to function in outdoor service units. The device integrates the tuning function, IF amplifier and automatic gain control onto a single device. The integrated frequency synthesizers include the voltage-controlled oscillators and phase-locked loops requiring no external resonator elements, the company said. "Our new product will help accelerate the adoption of cable-delivered digital telephony," said Dave Lyon, Silicon Wave 's chief executive officer. "This is an important step forward for the emerging cable telephony industry because it provides an economically feasible solution for operators to deliver digital telephony powered over hybrid fiber-coax networks." According to Silicon Wave, market research firm Cahners In-Stat Group, Scottsdale, Ariz., estimates that worldwide revenues from cable telephony services will grow from $293 million in 1999 to more than $7 billion by the year 2004. By the end of this year, In-Stat estimates there will be a worldwide installed base of almost 3 million cable telephone lines. Reference design circuits and evaluation kits are scheduled to be available soon.