Marvell Technology Group Ltd. has announced a new system on a chip (SoC) that is designed to support Ultra HD devices for both Android and the cable industry's Reference Design Kit (RDK) IP video software stack.
The new Armada 1500 Ultra (88DE3218) SoC has a 64-bit ARM CPU, which the company says makes it the first silicon provider to bring the 64-bit ARM architecture both to the mobile and the payTV segments.
Marvell’s chips already play an important role in the Android TV space, powering Google’s Chromecast streaming stick. They have also been used by Swisscom in Switzerland and Bouygues Telecom in France in settop boxes offering Android TV apps and services.
That helps bring together multiple types of content, ranging from over-the-top content to traditional pay TV channels into one system and enable both 4K deployments and settop gaming systems.
“I am very proud of our close collaboration with global leading service operators to bring Ultra HD, PayTV and over-the-top services to their subscribers,” said Weili Dai, president and cofounder of Marvell in a statement. “As consumers increasingly demand cutting-edge home entertainment experiences that include access to high-quality, 4K digital content, it is critical that operators offer compelling entertainment services from multiple sources with uncompromised image quality at an affordable cost.”
