Twelve More DOCSIS 2.0 Modems Gain CableLabs Certified Status.

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

LOUISVILLE, Colo.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 10, 2003

CableLabs Thursday reported that another 12 DOCSIS(R) 2.0 cable modems had achieved certification status during Certification Wave 25 that just concluded.

CableLabs(R) also announced that eight companies gained certified status for DOCSIS 1.1 products and one gained DOCSIS 1.1 qualified status for headend equipment.

DOCSIS 2.0 modems from Ambit, Arris, Castlenet, Com21, Hitron, LinkSys, Motorola, Scientific Atlanta, Terayon, and Thomson were certified.

DOCSIS 2.0 gives cable operators the ability to offer speeds up to 600 times faster than are available through standard dial-up telephone modems. This enables cable networks to carry so-called peer-to-peer and business services that require high-speed two-way capability. DOCSIS 2.0 is backward compatible with earlier versions of DOCSIS products, fully supporting advanced Internet Protocol (IP)-based cable services. It adds advanced digital modulation capabilities to cable modems and headend equipment enabling cable companies to increase by a factor of three the speed of the return (or upstream) path of their networks as compared to DOCSIS 1.1, or a factor of six as compared to DOCSIS 1.0.

"The supply community has quickly embraced and developed products in compliance with our DOCSIS 2.0 specifications," said Steve Craddock, Senior Vice President of New Media Development, Comcast Corporation. "This is a great volume of certified product coming forth, considering this is only our second DOCSIS 2.0 test wave."

"This is great news for our industry. We truly could not have had this kind of accomplishment so quickly without the help of a great community of supplying companies and the strong support of the cable operators," said CableLabs Broadband Access Vice President and Chief Architect Ralph Brown who heads the project. "We will continue our push to add to our family of DOCSIS specifications as new technologies warrant," Brown added.

There are now more than 370 cable high-speed Internet access devices that have received certification or qualification status in the last three and a half years of CableLabs testing. DOCSIS 1.0 modems were optimized for high-speed Internet access. DOCSIS 2.0 is backward compatible with DOCSIS 1.1, which opens a technological doorway to augmented revenue streams for cable providers by enabling the existence of high-speed Internet service tiers, via techniques known as data fragmentation and concatenation. Those techniques allow cable providers to deliver high-speed Internet services simultaneously over the same plant with guaranteed Quality of Service (QoS).

And, perhaps most importantly, equipment built to comply with the DOCSIS 1.1 specification becomes the foundation for expanding the list of advanced IP-based cable services offered by cable providers, including home networking through the CableLabs CableHome(TM) project, and packet telephony and multimedia services through the CableLabs PacketCable(TM) project.

As of Certification Wave 25, a total of 320 DOCSIS modems have received certification, including 73 1.1 modems; 54 CMTS have gained qualified status, including 24 1.1 CMTS. Nine modems received DOCSIS 1.1 certification in Wave 25 from Arris, D-Link, Kinpo, LinkSys, Scientific Atlanta, SMC Networks, Terayon, and Thomson; and one CMTS from Cisco.

Receiving DOCSIS 1.0 certification in Wave 25 were DX Antenna, Thomson and Toshiba.

As part of Certification Wave 25, CableLabs once again performed three parallel practice certification runs for equipment built to support CableHome 1.0, DOCSIS 2.0, and PacketCable 1.0. The vendor community is using the results of the practice run to refine their upcoming products that will be submitted for future certification waves.

Results of PacketCable and CableHome(TM) certification and qualification testing will be released April 11 at 9:00 a.m. MDT at www.cablelabs.com web site as well as through press distribution.

CableLabs(R) Certified(TM) or CableLabs Qualified means that the device has passed a series of tests for compliance with the indicated version of the Specification and has thus demonstrated interoperable functionality with any other "CableLabs certified/qualified" device. Many of these devices provide other functions or are designed to comply with other specifications, in each case tailored by the manufacturer to meet the growing needs of consumers or cable operators in an evolving communication/entertainment sector. While CableLabs encourages such innovation and diversity, the phrase CableLabs certified/qualified should not be understood as an endorsement of these other attributes (or that the product is certified to other specifications or versions), which are solely the responsibility of the company making the additional claims.

Founded in 1988 by members of the cable television industry, Cable Television Laboratories is a non-profit research and development consortium that is dedicated to pursuing new cable telecommunications technologies and to helping its cable operator members integrate those advancements into their business objectives. Cable operators from around the world are members. CableLabs maintains web sites at www.cablelabs.com; www.packetcable.com; www.cablemodem.com; www.cablenet.org; and www.opencable.com.