Farncombe creates set-top design practice

TV software engineering and testing company Farncombe has launched a hardware design practice targeting mid-size manufacturers looking for support with digital TV receiver design.

David Fields, who has over 10 years’ experience designing set-top boxes and peripheral devices, has joined Farncombe to head up the new practice.

“Currently, major receiver manufacturers typically use the chipset vendors’ ‘reference-boards’ – which can be large and require significant investment – based on which they will subsequently produce, in-house, low quantities of ‘intermediate’ smaller prototypes for proof-of-concept and demonstration purposes,” said Fields. “These are then ‘tweaked’ into the required form factor for integration into receiver production lines. But the smaller players often can’t support that ‘intermediate’ step themselves: that’s where Farncombe comes in.”