Advanced Digital Broadcast (ADB) is a company which provides software, system and services to

pay-TV Pay television, also known as subscription television, premium television or, when referring to an individual service, a premium channel, refers to subscription-based television services, usually provided by multichannel television providers, but ...

and telecommunication operators, content distributors and property owners around the world. The company specializes also in the development of digital connectivity devices such as

set-top box A set-top box (STB), also colloquially known as a cable box and historically television decoder, is an information appliance device that generally contains a TV-tuner input and displays output to a television set and an external source of s ...

es and

residential gateway A residential gateway is a small consumer-grade gateway which bridges network access between connected local area network (LAN) hosts to a wide area network (WAN) (such as the Internet) via a modem, or directly connects to a WAN (as in EttH), ...

s. ADB's global headquarters is located in Bellevue,

Switzerland ). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...

. The company has research and development facilities in

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populou ...

and

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

and an Operations division in

Taipei Taipei (), officially Taipei City, is the capital and a special municipality of the Republic of China (Taiwan). Located in Northern Taiwan, Taipei City is an enclave of the municipality of New Taipei City that sits about southwest of the ...

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the no ...

. ADB has local offices in several countries in

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...

and the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

. Founded in 1995, ADB initially focused on developing and marketing software for

digital TV Digital television (DTV) is the transmission of television signals using digital encoding, in contrast to the earlier analog television technology which used analog signals. At the time of its development it was considered an innovative advanc ...

processors A central processing unit (CPU), also called a central processor, main processor or just processor, is the electronic circuitry that executes instructions comprising a computer program. The CPU performs basic arithmetic, logic, controlling, a ...

and expanded its business to the design and manufacture of digital TV equipment in 1997. The company sold its first set-top box in 1997 and since then has been delivering a number of set-top boxes, and residential gateways, together with advanced software platforms. ADB has sold over 64 million devices worldwide to cable, satellite, IPTV and broadband operators. ADB employs over 350 people, of which 70% are in engineering functions.

History

In 1995, ADB was founded by Andrew Rybicki, Janusz C. Szajna, Krzysztof Kolbuszewski, Mariusz Walkowiak, and Stanley Hemphill with an initial focus on developing and marketing software for advanced digital TV processors. In 1997, ADB started designing and manufacturing of digital TV equipment. ADB designed its first commercial set-to box, and established its dedicated R&D facility in Poland and corporate headquarters in Taiwan. Between 1998 and 2000 offices were opened in Australia, and Spain, and ADB sold its one millionth set-top box. In 2001, ADB announced the development of an open standard set-top box middleware based on the Multimedia Home Platform (MHP) specification and established its worldwide headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland. In 2002, the company opened its Americas headquarters in Chicago (since moved to Denver). and became the world's first set-top box provider to launch an MHP digital receiver, the i-CAN 3000, in Finland. In 2003, ADB delivered set-top boxes for the launch of digital terrestrial TV services in Italy, announced the world's first hybrid MHP Internet set-top box with terrestrial reception and became the first company to supply the television industry with MHP-compliant set-top boxes. The company received a German-Polish Innovation award and a Cable & Satellite International (CSI) Product of the Year award for its i-CAN 3000 set-top box. In 2005, ADB Group was floated on the Swiss Stock Exchange (SWX) and ADB secured its first major IPTV contract to supply set-top boxes to

Telefónica Telefónica, S.A. () is a Spanish multinational telecommunications company headquartered in Madrid, Spain. It is one of the largest telephone operators and mobile network providers in the world. It provides fixed and mobile telephony, broadba ...

in Spain. The company unveiled its first single-chip

MPEG-4 AVC Advanced Video Coding (AVC), also referred to as H.264 or MPEG-4 Part 10, is a video compression standard based on block-oriented, motion-compensated coding. It is by far the most commonly used format for the recording, compression, and distr ...

based set-top box, the ADB-7800TW. In the same year ADB established new R&D Centre in Kharkiv, Ukraine. In 2006 ADB introduced European-based manufacturing and shipped its eight millionth set-top box. The company partnered with UK broadcasters the BBC, Channel 4, Five and ITV.in for the first HDTV field trial on the UK's digital terrestrial network. This year ADB participated also in a pilot with Italian broadcaster RAI for the world's first HDTV transmission using

video compression during coverage of the Winter Olympics from Turin, Italy. In 2007, ADB deployed first IPTV STB on North American Telco Network In 2008, ADB deployed its 12 millionth set-top box and introduced tru2way certified set-top boxes for the interactive cable TV market. The same year, ADB received Product of the Year award by IBC and IPTV World Series Awards. In 2009, ADB was announced TV Innovator of the Year & Best set-top box technology provider by IMS RESEARCH In 2010, ADB Group acquired Pirelli Broadband Solutions, thus entering the broadband market. In the same year ADB became Indonesia's first HD interactive set-top solution provider. ADB received 2 Product of the Year awards by CSI at IBC. In 2015, ADB rebranded, changed the company logo and published a combined offer to acquire all publicly held shares of the company, becoming a privately held company. In 2016, ADB's personal TV platform graphyne2 won the Best of Show 2016 award and CSI Award for Best interactive TV technology or application during IBC in Amsterdam. In 2018, ADB implements Wi-Fi Mesh Technology to the company's portfolio. In 2021, ADB introduces a premium fiber optic access gateway with Wi-Fi 6 to the company's product portfolio.

Products

ADB is a global supplier of set-top boxes and residential gateways to cable, satellite, IP, terrestrial television operators, and broadband service providers. The company sells software for advanced pay-TV services, such as catch-up, start-over, multi-room video recording, VOD, interactive TV and internet applications, consumer devices,

middleware Middleware is a type of computer software that provides services to software applications beyond those available from the operating system. It can be described as "software glue". Middleware makes it easier for software developers to implement ...

, applications, head ends; broadband access gateways and home networking devices; remote management software; and life-cycle and integration services.

References

{{reflist, 30em Television technology Interactive television Video on demand Broadband Companies based in the canton of Geneva