ESS Technology Licenses Kilopass XPM Memory Technology

XPM for Key Storage in HDMI/HDCP Applications
 
SANTA CLARA, California – February 7, 2006 –Kilopass Technology, a leading provider of semiconductor non-volatile memory (NVM) intellectual property (IP) for standard CMOS logic, announced today that ESS Technology, a provider of high-performance digital video processors and image sensor semiconductors, licensed Kilopass’ low-cost, highly secure One-Time Programmable (OTP) XPM memory technology for use in its products. ESS uses XPM technology for HDMI/HDCP key storage in its ICs.
 
“Using Kilopass’ XPM IP in our ICs makes it possible for us to reduce the number of parts in our reference designs, thus reducing our customers’ product cost, making our products more competitive in the global markets” said Aki Kaniel, director of marketing for ESS Technology. “Other benefits of XPM include its low cost, standard CMOS process implementation and the enhanced security for our HDCP keys.”
 
“ESS Technology’s adoption of XPM demonstrates the value of our non-volatile memory for secure digital video content protection,” stated Kilopass’ Charles Ng, vice president of worldwide sales and marketing. “For HDCP-compliant and HDMI-enabled ICs, such as those developed by ESS, XPM enables low-cost, field-programmable, and highly secure storage of the HDCP device keys and other identifiers this type of products requires.”
 
About High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection & Security Keys
Intel developed HDCP (High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection) to “protect” digital audio and video content transmitted via Digital Visual Interface (DVI) or High Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) connections. With the HDCP protocol, a video receiver or display confirms to a video transmitter that the receiver is authorized to receive the protected content, by demonstrating knowledge of a set of secret device keys. Security protection systems and their secure keys are essential in digital content protection systems. The security of these keys, which are stored inside a chip in non-volatile memory, is paramount - if a key is stolen, the entire system is compromised - valuable content may be lost, and the content owner might also lose revenue that could be obtained through legal use of the content.
 
About XPM
Kilopass’ silicon-proven, low-cost and highly secure XPM memory technology, offers the benefits of post-manufacturing programming of non-volatile memory implemented in standard-logic CMOS processes, including 0.18um, 0.13um, and 90nm.
 
About Kilopass Technology
Kilopass Technology, Inc. was founded with the mission of becoming the industry leader in
Embedded NVM technology. The Company's super-permanent memory technology is manufactured using standard commercial CMOS processes, and is used for storage of firmware and security codes. Kilopass has been included in all four iterations of the Silicon 60, EE Times’ list of 60 emerging startups, and was recently listed as one of the startups shaping tomorrow's technology by EETimes.
 
Kilopass is headquartered at 3333 Octavius Dr. Suite 101, Santa Clara, CA 95054, USA.
For more information, please visit http://www.kilopass.com, call
(408) 980-8808 or email klptinfo@kilopass.com.
 
About ESS Technology
ESS Technology, Inc., designs and markets high-performance digital video processors and image sensor semiconductors for the consumer digital entertainment, digital home, and camera-enabled cellular phone markets. ESS products include highly integrated chips for DVD players, VCD players, digital media players, digital audio systems, and camera-enabled cellular phones. ESS is headquartered in Fremont, California and the Company’s stock is traded on the Nasdaq National market under “ESST”. For more information, please visit ESS Technology at http://www.esstech.com.