EBIF Coming to DTAs

The Enhanced TV Binary Interchange Format (EBIF) platform is typically associated with interactive polls, ads, and other ITV apps, but at least one cable player wants to use it as a quasi-middleware that could jazz up simple, one-way Digital Terminal Adapter (DTA) boxes.

Evolution Digital LLC revealed to Light Reading Cable that the Colorado-based maker of standard-def and hi-def DTAs has an EBIF strategy well underway, intending to use the software platform to help it develop a broad range of DTA-focused applications, starting with user interfaces that can be customized by cable operators.

Evolution president Brent Smith said his company has already struck a partnership with a company that makes the EBIF user agent (the software client that goes in the set-top). He isn't naming it yet, but possible candidates include FourthWall Media Inc. , Zodiac Interactive , Navic Networks (now part of Microsoft Corp. (Nasdaq: MSFT)), and Comcast Corp. (Nasdaq: CMCSA, CMCSK), which has developed its own EBIF user agent.

The EBIF UI (user interface) is considered phase one of Evolution's plan, but Smith envisions the creation of an open architecture that would allow third parties to write EBIF apps for its DTAs. The next phase could include apps such as caller ID to the TV or "bound" EBIF apps, such as a poll, that are associated with a live program.

That work could expand the capabilities of the DTA, an inexpensive, one-way digital-to-analog converter that's typically been used in MSO analog spectrum reclamation projects. (See Comcast's $1B Bandwidth Plan and Insight Joins the DTA Dance .)

DTAs aren't "interactive" because they don't have a return path. However, "bound and unbound [EBIF apps] are still very doable in a one-way environment," Smith insists, noting that every DTA Evolution sells has the capability to operate an EBIF user agent.

"We look at this as a great opportunity to continue to evolve a one-way, basic DTA that creates more value to the customer to help the digital transition," he says. "Our baseline is to ensure that EBIF becomes the de facto middleware platform for our D-to-A strategy."

Smith says Evolution is proposing the idea to several operators, including CablemAxA1s of Mexico, which is in the process of deploying 200,000 SD and HD DTAs from Evolution outfitted with Conax AS security as the MSO ramps up a digital transition based on the Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB) standard. (See Cable Catchup .)

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