FREMONT, CA – The Open IPTV Forum (OIPF) and MPEG Industry Forum (MPEGIF) have announced plans to consolidate and merge the assets of MPEGIF into the OIPF.
The two organizations said Monday that the decision comes as the MPEG Industry Forum activities reached a “natural and successful conclusion” with the emergence of MPEG-4 Part 10, (alternatively known as H.264), as the dominant codec in next generation video technology and the proven successor to MPEG-2.
Asset mergers like this represent natural consolidation in a maturing industry and are the positive result of cross-industry consensus on fundamental technologies, the announcement continued. Now, in an ever converging, cross-media, global market, the challenge going forward is to enable interoperability across increasingly complex connected consumer devices and services on a global scale. This is the mandate of the specifications developed by OIPF and the “clear logic” behind the consolidation of MPEGIF’s efforts and assets into the OIPF.
"When the MPEG Industry Forum was founded the future of IP based video technology was far from clear, except that the industry knew that conventional TV services were going to be radically and permanently changed", said MPEGIF president David Price, in the announcement.
"At the center of this revolution was the emergence of new, highly efficient codecs that enabled new business models such as TV over DSL and broadband television. As the premier industry body advocating adoption of standards based technologies with over 100 companies in its membership, MPEGIF used educational MasterClasses at major trade shows and 9 rounds of interoperability testing to show that MPEG-4 AVC (H.264) was the clear successor to MPEG-2 for the next generation of services. We are pleased to declare ‘victory’ and merge the assets of the forum into the Open IPTV Forum going forward.”
“We are pleased to contribute towards this consolidation of the work from the MPEGIF and welcome those additional members from the MPEGIF who join our efforts”, added OIPF president Nilo Mitra. “The end result is that the Open IPTV Forum will be an even stronger and more vigorous industry body, representing all constituents and contributors within the ecosystem of businesses creating and delivering the next generation of television entertainment”
