(Nikkei BP Group)
(No.1 High-Tech News Site in Japanese)
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| Super VCD, Home Servers Highlight Hong Kong Electronics Fair
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October 20, 1998 (HONG KONG) - Chinese-standard Super VCD devices and
home servers made in Taiwan attracted crowds at Hong Kong Electronics
Fair '98 held Oct. 13-16.
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Hong Kong's largest electronics products showcase also had on exhibit
radio-cassette players, video CD players, televisions with huge screens,
car audio products and other audio visual equipment, regular telephone
machines and cellular phones, pagers, connectors, speakers and laser
components.
The exhibition was to provide opportunities to businesspeople for negotiations
even more than for displaying the latest technologies from Asia. Visitors
from Europe, Asia and the Middle East were negotiating prices at booths
throughout the floor.
Super VCD attracted the largest attention. A total of 14 Chinese manufacturers
of video CD players, such as Jiangsu Shinco Electronics Group Co., Ltd.,
Shenzhen ASIC Design Corp. and Shanghai Shanglu Electronics Co., Ltd.
showcased products. Sony Electronic Devices Ltd. of Hong Kong also exhibited
its products. However, all optical pickup components and decoder ICs
were made in Japan or the United States.
Super VCD is a standard adopted this month by China's Ministry of Information
Industry. The standard employs the MPEG2 encoder and decoder format.
Its picture quality was improved by increasing the number of horizontal
lines on a video CD from 250 to 350.
A 12cm-discs can play video and voice for 40 minutes. For this reason,
most of the participating manufacturers were playing Super VCD players
with built-in, three-disc changers.
A DVD player developed by Comjet Information Systems Corp. was also in
the spotlight at the exhibition. The player was equipped with a 266MHz
Pentium II microprocessor and a 2.5GB hard disk drive. It can replay
DVDs and video CDs. Users also can use a Web browser, email and a telephone
with an answering machine to check receipt of fax transmissions and
trade stocks real time with the player.
Joe Y. K. Shue, the firm's assistant vice president, said, "This is a
Taiwanese version of a home server. We have already started negotiating
with foreign makers, including IBM Corp. of the United States, Toshiba
Corp. and Sharp Corp. of Japan, for OEM production. The product will
be priced at US$850."
Hong Kong Electronics Fair '98 was held jointly with Electronic Asia
'98 and Laser Asia '98, exhibitions of electronic parts and laser products.
A record 1,388 companies exhibited their products at one or another of
the three showcases, up 21 percent from the previous show, when 1,150
companies participated. Of the participating companies, Hong Kong makers
accounted for 922, up 16 percent from the previous show. Taiwan companies
made up 211, up 15 percent, and Chinese manufacturers represented 175,
up 58 percent.
More details on the exhibition can be obtained at: http://hkelectronic
sfair.tdc.org.hk/
(Nikkei Electronics)
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