Sorenson Spark Video Decoder Enables Highly Optimized Software for Chipsets to Playback Largest Installed Base of Internet Video on Mobile Devices
SAN DIEGO (June 29, 2009)-Sorenson Media and VisualOn today announced that the Sorenson Spark Software Developers Kit (SDK) has been licensed by VisualOn to add the Sorenson Spark decoder into VisualOn Mobile Multimedia Products. VisualOn has optimized and integrated Sorenson Spark into its multimedia application suite, enabling mobile handsets to playback the largest installed base of Internet video.
Sorenson Spark is the industry’s most ubiquitous video codec and was the first codec used in Macromedia Flash, now Adobe Flash. The decoder exclusively enables the playback of hundreds of millions of videos on the Internet, including those on YouTube, the single largest online video destination site today. The Sorenson Spark SDK allows developers to integrate the Sorenson Spark decoder into a wide array of programmable chipsets and semiconductors. The kit is designed to provide Sorenson Spark decoding on any platform, including custom silicon.
Installed on mobile device chipsets, VisualOn’s highly optimized software applications enable mobile devices to play rich multimedia content without expensive dedicated hardware. The software increases the quality and performance of the device and uses less power when accessing multimedia applications. VisualOn counts some of the largest device manufacturers among its clients.
“The Sorenson Spark codec is a standard in the Internet video industry and is a must-have for consumers to be able to view all of the video the Internet has to offer,” said Dr. Yang Cai, CEO at VisualOn. “Integrating the Sorenson Spark decoder in our software application further solidifies our ability to enable mobile devices to more effectively and efficiently playback the widest selection of multimedia content.”
“This partnership with VisualOn reflects the strong and accelerating demand that we continue to see for Sorenson Spark,” said Peter Csathy, president and CEO of Sorenson Media. “Video is fast becoming critical on mobile phones and other portable devices, and Sorenson Spark is recognized as being essential to give consumers the ability to view the broadest and deepest base of online video content, including hundreds of millions of videos that cannot be accessed with any other codec.”
Recently Jan Ozer at Streaming Learning Center produced a video tutorial on producing the best looking H.264 video for Flash with Squeeze. This is a great tutorial filled with all the necessary information to effectively and quickly create high quality flash video.
As Competitors Retrench or Disappear, Industry-leading and Profitable Internet Video Services Company Continues to Hire Sales, Marketing and Engineering Marketing Professionals
SAN DIEGO (June 22, 2009)-Sorenson Media today announced that it plans to expand its workforce to fuel its ongoing growth and fulfill burgeoning market demand for high-quality, cost-effective Internet video solutions, including the company’s recently unveiled Sorenson 360 Video Delivery Network (VDN). Sorenson Media is currently seeking to augment its workforce in all functional areas, with a focus on adding sales, marketing and engineering talent in both its San Diego and Salt Lake City offices.
“As competitors in the Internet video space scale back and even suspend operations in the midst of scarce funding and failed business models, we are uniquely proven and profitable and looking to add industry professionals who will help us expand our market presence and drive our ongoing innovation,” said Peter Csathy, president and CEO of Sorenson Media. “The overall Internet video market opportunity is only in its early innings, and we have been a pioneer in enabling high-quality Internet video for fourteen years. We now plan to lead the next evolutionary phases of the Internet video marketplace during this exciting time of growth and promise.”
Founded in 1995, Sorenson Media has helped foster the development of online video with seminal innovations, including: the globally influential Sorenson Spark video codec; the industry-leading Sorenson Squeeze encoding application; Sorenson Squish and SquishNet, a browser-based video publishing platform for user-generated content; and most recently, Sorenson 360, an all-in-one hosted service that serves a complete Internet video publishing solution for video professionals and small- to medium-sized businesses.
In contrast with its competitors in the Internet video marketplace - most of which are venture-backed and were founded only in the past few years - Sorenson Media is fully funded and has maintained consistent profitability over several years. While other companies have scaled back their product development efforts or disappeared completely, Sorenson Media has experienced stable and consistent revenue growth, marked by continual product innovation.
“Sorenson Media has a long-respected and trusted name, and an ongoing commitment to innovation and excellence,” said Csathy. “Employees, customers and strategic partners can count on the reality that we’re going to be around and that we’re going to continue to create the best products and services in the marketplace. We feel we are uniquely positioned to capture significant share in the burgeoning space of Internet video. It is a wonderful time for talented and passionate individuals to be a part of what we’re building here.”
For more information about employment opportunities at Sorenson Media in both the San Diego and Salt Lake City offices, visit: http://www.sorensonmedia.com/jobs/.
Enjoy the major H.264 video quality and deinterlacing enhancements in Squeeze 5.1. If you have any previous version of Squeeze you can upgrade to Squeeze 5 Pro for only $199 (Save $100) or Squeeze 5 for only $99 (Save $50). Already have Squeeze 5? Download the Squeeze 5.1 update now. Don’t wait, this is a limited time offer.
New in Squeeze 5.1-
Highest Quality H.264 - Utilize the best quality available video in the most versatile format in the world. Enhanced Deinterlacing - Make interlacing and ghosting a thing of the past with new Squeeze filters. Integrated Sorenson 360 Workflow - Publish, manage and track your web video with Sorenson 360.
H.264 video and deinterlacing quality in Sorenson Squeeze.
Today we announced that Imagination Technologies will include Sorenson Spark in its future versions of POWERVR™. Below is the full press release:
LONDON, UK and SAN DIEGO (June 15, 2009) - Imagination Technologies, a leading multimedia chip technologies company, and Sorenson Media today announced that Imagination will include Sorenson Media’s Sorenson Spark video decoder in future versions of its line of advanced POWERVR™ VXD video decoder IP cores sold to semiconductor and consumer electronics companies. The cores are used in mobile phones, handheld multimedia devices, home consumer entertainment products, mobile and low-power computing devices, and in-car electronics.
Imagination Technologies is the newest licensee of the Sorenson Spark Software Developers Kit, which provides the necessary information and tools for Imagination to implement the Sorenson Spark decoder into its POWERVR VXD cores. Imagination plans to release Sorenson Spark-enabled POWERVR VXD cores in the coming year. Sorenson Spark is the industry’s most widely deployed video codec, used on hundreds of millions of Internet videos, including those on YouTube, the market leader in online video streaming. The Sorenson Spark decoder was the first codec used in Macromedia Flash, now Adobe Flash, today’s de facto standard for Web video.
Peter Csathy, president and CEO of Sorenson Media says: “We are delighted to work with Imagination, a proven leader in semiconductor IP core technology. By embedding the Sorenson Spark decoder in their new IP cores destined for use in consumer electronic products, Imagination will give consumers the power to watch the widest selection of videos on the Internet, a majority of which uses the Sorenson Spark codec.”
Tony King-Smith, VP marketing, Imagination Technologies, says: “Sorenson’s leading and market proven decoder technologies are a perfect fit for our video IP cores. We are pleased to add Sorenson Spark to the wide range of decoders already supported by POWERVR VXD, further proving its adaptability and extending its already comprehensive support for the wide range of video codecs used across the Internet application space.”
About Imagination Technologies
Imagination Technologies Group plc (LSE:IMG) – a global leader in multimedia and communication silicon technologies – creates and licenses market-leading processor cores for graphics, video, multi-threaded embedded processing/DSP and multi-standard communications applications. These silicon intellectual property (IP) solutions for systems-on-chip (SoC) are complemented by strong array of software tools and drivers as well as extensive developer and middleware ecosystems. Target markets include mobile phone, handheld multimedia, home consumer entertainment, mobile and low-power computing, and in-car electronics. Its licensees include many of the leading semiconductor and consumer electronics companies. Imagination has corporate headquarters in the United Kingdom, with sales and R&D offices worldwide. See: www.imgtec.com.
Sorenson 360 of course! More specifically, Macworld.com is talking about the fact that Sorenson 360 can now publish your web videos directly to the iPhone without having to use a separate app. Once you publish your videos using Sorenson 360 your audience will be able to view your content not only online, but on their iPhones as well. This all happens automatically. Sorenson 360 detects how your audience is trying to view your video and gives them the best playback experience, not just a broken link like all flash video viewed on the iPhone.
Here is the full story from Macworld:
Sorenson 360 adds direct-to-iPhone video publishing
Sorenson Media has announced that its Sorenson 360 video delivery network (VDN) now supports direct-to-iPhone video publishing.
Launched in May, Sorenson 360 is a video hosting service aimed at individuals, small businesses and other content creators to share video over the Web. Users can encode their videos as Flash or H.264 files using Sorenson Squeeze 5 or Squish, a Java applet that runs in a browser.
The new ability lets Sorenson 360 users encode and publish video content optimized for direct viewing by iPhone users. Sorenson 360 will detect how the user is accessing the video file—through a regular desktop browser on a computer, or through the Mobile Safari browser on the iPhone. Based on that info, Sorenson 360 then delivers a video file using the appropriate format.
The service works with all versions of the iPhone and iPod touch. Videos for the iPhone are encoded using the H.264 format with MP4 output, up to 1Mbps, 640 x 480 pixels and 30 frames per second.
Today, we announce the immediate availability of iPhone publishing directly from Sorenson 360. This means—using the power of 360—you can now reach your audience anywhere – including on the iPhone. See for yourself:
This new solution enables small- to medium-sized businesses, video professionals, bloggers and other content creators to quickly and seamlessly encode and publish the highest quality video content* on the Internet for direct viewing by Apple iPhone users (i.e. through the iPhone’s Safari 4 Web browser and without any need for a separate app).
The way it works… Sorenson 360 automatically detects the manner in which the user is accessing a video file — whether through a traditional browser on a desktop or laptop computer, or through the iPhone’s Web browser. Based on this information, Sorenson 360 then automatically delivers the video file using the appropriate player — a Flash player for users on desktops or laptops, or an iPhone-compatible player for iPhone users.
“With the addition of iPhone publishing for Sorenson 360, Sorenson Media is greatly expanding the reach and power of what is already the most cost-effective and user-friendly online video publishing solution in the marketplace,” said Peter Csathy, CEO of Sorenson Media. “Up to this point, video playback on the iPhone has simply been out of reach for video professionals. This new release reinforces the hallmarks of Sorenson 360 — unparalleled quality, innovation, flexibility, ease-of-use and affordability. It is now easier than ever for anyone to publish iPhone-ready video content over the Internet.”
Adding to the good news- Sorenson 360 is compatible with all versions of Apple iPhone, iPhone 3G S, iPhone 3G (plus prior versions 1 – 2) and Apple iPod Touch via WiFi. This includes iPhone OS 3.0 Software and the Safari 4 browser.
*Video specifications for Sorenson 360 iPhone presets are H.264 video — MP4 output, up to 1 Mbps, 640 by 480 pixels, 30 frames per second, 480-by-320-pixel resolution at 163 ppi.
Sign up for today’s webinar and see what’s got everybody talking. The webinar will be presented by Peter Csathy, CEO and David Dudas, VP Product Management. Space is limited so don’t miss this opportunity.
Here is what the Pro’s are saying about Sorenson 360:
“Need high quality encoding with a more than reasonable way to serve the videos you need to put online? Look no further than Sorenson Media’s new Video Delivery Network called “Sorenson 360″.
- Jerry Hoffman, Creative Cow.
“Although many companies are now jumping on the online video bandwagon, especially if it’s HD one, Sorenson Media isn’t ordinary company. In fact, many video professionals and content creators in Hollywood rely on Sorenson applications to streamline video editing and encoding. That said, the fact that a respectable pioneer of computer-based video is entering the online video field is a big deal, if not a game-changer.”
- Christian Zibreg, Geek.com
“Sorenson Media’s Sorenson 360 is new online video platform with an outstanding workflow.”
- Jan Ozer, Streaming Media
“Sorenson Media redefines online video publishing with 360 Video Delivery Network”
-Larry Kless, onlinevideopublishing.com
“Sorenson 360 let’s you start your own video network for $99 month. That’s a lot less than what you’d have to pay for your own cable channel, but what you get is nearly as powerful.”
- Gretchen Siegchrist, About.com
“The Sorenson 360 Web site is designed as a simple interface where a user can drag and drop a video onto the page. Users choose how it is coded and can upload the video to multiple sites in minutes.”
- Tom Harvey, Salt Lake Tribune
“Beyond its reputation for high-quality video, Sorenson’s client-side encoding approach (meaning videos are compressed before you send them off, either through an application or a browser applet) may give customers a significant cost reduction because it helps the company avoid charging upload fees for pushing big video files onto the network. “
- Liz Gannes, New TeeVee
Ittiam and NXP Semiconductors Join Qualcomm, Verizon, Sony, YouTube and Numerous Others in Licensing Sorenson Spark from Sorenson Media to Enable their Users to Playback the World’s Largest Selection of Internet Videos
SAN DIEGO (June 02, 2009)—Sorenson Media today announced a significant expansion of its Sorenson Spark licensing program as a result of accelerating market demand and proliferation of Internet video. Sorenson Spark is the Internet’s most widely deployed video codec, powering hundreds of millions of Internet videos, including those on YouTube, the volume leader in online video streaming. Companies looking to add video functionality to mobile phones and other consumer electronic devices – including those bringing video into the living room – must have the Sorenson Spark video decoder to enable users to playback that full world of Internet video.
As part of its announcement, Sorenson Media named new licensing partners for its Sorenson Spark video decoder. Ittiam and NXP Semiconductors are among the latest companies to license Sorenson Spark from Sorenson Media — joining Qualcomm, Verizon, Sony, YouTube and numerous others — to enable Internet video on consumer electronic devices, including the new generation of high-performance, low-power, multimedia-rich mobile phones, mobile computing devices, set-top boxes and Internet-connected TVs.
“The Sorenson Spark decoder has become ubiquitous in the embedded space,” said Shantanu Jha, vice president media processing at Ittiam Systems. “Because of this, we saw a critical need to enable Sorenson Spark video decoding on our vast multimedia application array.”
Sorenson Media’s Sorenson Spark Software Developers Kit (SDK) enables developers to integrate the Sorenson Spark decoder into a wide array of programmable chipsets and semiconductors. The SDK is designed to provide Sorenson Spark decoding on any platform, including custom silicon.
“Industry-leading consumer electronic device manufacturers are greatly enriching the Internet video experience for their customers by licensing the Sorenson Spark video decoder,” said Peter Csathy, president and CEO of Sorenson Media. “We are seeing phenomenal growth in the number of ways people can watch Web video, and we are still only in the early innings of the Internet video revolution. Our licensing partners recognize that the Sorenson Spark video decoder is a must-have to enable consumers to enjoy the full world of Internet video.”
