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MIPS Technologies and Sigma Designs Bring Full HD Experience to Android™ Platform


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Major Step Forward in Creation of Reference Platform for Android Set-top Box

SUNNYVALE, Calif. - MIPS Technologies, Inc. (NasdaqGS: MIPS), a leading provider of industry-standard processor architectures and cores for digital consumer, home networking, wireless, communications and business applications, and Sigma Designs, Inc. (Nasdaq: SIGM), a leader in digital media processing system-on-chip (SoC) solutions for consumer electronics, today announced they are bringing a full high-definition (HD) experience to the revolutionary AndroidTM platform.

At the DIGITIMES Tech Forum Multimedia Day in Taipei on August 27th, the companies will demonstrate an Android-based system displaying 1080p video on a full HD flat screen display. This HD video demonstration is a major milestone toward the creation of a reference platform for an Android-based set-top box (STB)-a goal that Sigma and MIPS have been jointly working toward with other members of the STB working group of the Open Embedded Software Foundation (OESF). The goal of the OESF consortium is to drive Android into new consumer electronics segments beyond the mobile handset, where Android is already finding success.

“After showing a Blu-ray reference design for Android in June, we are pleased to now show full HD video on a MIPS-Based platform from Sigma-a platform that was selected as an official Android reference port for the OESF STB working group,” said Ken Lowe, vice president of strategic marketing, Sigma Designs. “Support for Android is a priority on Sigma’s roadmap as we enable our customers to quickly, easily and cost-effectively bring exciting new functionality to their next-generation of connected devices including DTVs, STBs and Blu-ray players.”

“We are excited to join with Sigma to announce this latest Android on MIPS milestone and another industry-first,” said Art Swift, vice president of marketing at MIPS Technologies. “Since we announced public availability of the Android on MIPS source code earlier this month, over 600 people have registered to access the code, and we actually had to add server and network capacity in order to meet demand! Together with our ecosystem partners, silicon partners and Early Access Customers, we are making incredible progress in driving Android into devices beyond the mobile handset.”

To enable Android to run on an HD screen rather than the small screen of a mobile handset, Sigma and MIPS undertook enhancements to Android libraries and the MIPS architecture. Sigma Designs extended libraries within Android to support hardware graphics acceleration and hardware decoding to take advantage of their SoC capabilities for HD. MIPS Technologies is also making performance optimizations specifically for the MIPS32® architecture. This optimized code will be available in the future as part of the publicly-available Android on MIPS code.

About Android on MIPS

Leveraging its leadership position in the digital home, MIPS Technologies is spearheading efforts to make Android a reality for devices beyond the mobile handset. With Android and the dynamic open source development community around it, developers can easily and quickly create new applications, and OEMs can leverage a fast-growing set of applications for their devices. The MIPS® ecosystem around Android, including solutions from partners such as AllGo Systems, D2 Technologies, Mentor Graphics Corporation and Viosoft Corporation, enables OEMs to quickly optimize Android for their specific platforms and debug their solutions across the entire software stack.

For more information about the Android platform and MIPS, or to access the full source code for MIPS Technologies’ port of Android to the MIPS32® architecture, including a reference binary and documentation, please visit www.mips.com/android or email android@mips.com.

About Sigma Designs, Inc.

Sigma Designs is a leading fabless provider of highly integrated SoC solutions that are used to deliver multimedia entertainment throughout the home. Sigma’s SoC solutions include media processors and wireless communication devices which combine semiconductors and software as critical components of high-growth consumer applications including IPTV-based set-top boxes, Blu-ray players, HDTVs, entertainment connectivity devices and RF-based home control devices. Headquartered in Milpitas, Calif., Sigma Designs also has design centers or sales offices in Canada, China, Denmark, France, Japan, Korea (third party), Singapore and Taiwan. For more information, please visit Sigma Designs’ web site at www.sigmadesigns.com.

About MIPS Technologies, Inc.

MIPS Technologies, Inc. (NasdaqGS: MIPS) is a leading provider of industry-standard processor architectures and cores that power some of the world’s most popular products for the home entertainment, communications, networking and portable multimedia markets. These include broadband devices from Linksys, DTVs and digital consumer devices from Sony, DVD recordable devices from Pioneer, digital set-top boxes from Motorola, network routers from Cisco, 32-bit microcontrollers from Microchip Technology and laser printers from Hewlett-Packard. Founded in 1998, MIPS Technologies is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California, with offices worldwide. For more information, contact (408) 530-5000 or visit www.mips.com.

MIPS, MIPS32, and MIPS-Based are trademarks or registered trademarks in the United States and other countries of MIPS Technologies, Inc. All other trademarks referred to herein are the property of their respective owners.

Android is a trademark of Google Inc. Use of this trademark is subject to Google Permissions.



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