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Strategy Analytics: Next Major Technology Wave Is Multimedia Home Networking (28/10/2004)

Global sales of home networking devices, such as digital media servers and receivers, will reach a cumulative 350 million units over the next five years, according to Strategy Analytics' latest report, 'Connected Home Devices: Global Market Forecast.' Technology leaders, including Cisco/Linksys, Microsoft, Philips, Samsung and Sony, are bidding alongside emerging players, like Entropic, Ucentric and Video Without Boundaries, for a share of this newly emerging and fast-growing market.

"Consumers' desire to share content from multiple sources across connected devices is driving the next phase of evolution in digital consumer electronics," states Peter King, Senior Analyst. "People will increasingly expect to use next-generation fixed and mobile devices to access their stored content from a central media server."

Digital media receivers will include devices which are integrated with wired and wireless home networking technologies, such as connected TV sets, DVD players, audio systems, portable media players and smart phones.

Digital media servers will emerge in both PC and DVR set-top box configurations. Strategy Analytics concludes that sales of PC-based digital media servers will outnumber those of DVRs by a factor of four to one.

There will also be a growing market for external digital media receivers, which allow content on a PC to be accessed on other devices. Examples include the Wireless-B Media Adapter from Cisco-owned Linksys. Annual global sales of such devices will reach 46.9 million units by 2009.

"The connected home vision is slowly but surely becoming a reality," notes David Mercer, Principal Analyst. "However, developers must overcome technical hurdles like complex installation procedures and device incompatibility, which currently make plug-and-play multimedia home networking a headache for the vast majority of consumers. Digital content rights issues remain another potential roadblock on the path towards mass market adoption."

www.strategyanalytics.com