MONTVALE, N.J.—Sharp Home Electronics Company of America has reentered the U.S. TV market by launching a new lineup of Sharp Roku TV OLED 4K UHD with HDR10 and LCD 4K UHD TVs.

The OLED models also feature the AQUOS TV sub-branding name that is associated with cutting-edge technology and quality, the company said. 

The Sharp Roku TV OLED 4K Ultra HD with HDR10 TV models are the first OLED televisions in the world to feature the Roku experience and operating system.  Available in 55" Class (54.5" Diag.) and 65" Class (64.5" Diag.) screen sizes, they also feature Dolby Vision IQ and Dolby Atmos technologies, Sharp reported. 

Sharp said its integration of the Roku TV streaming platform provides consumers with access to endless free, live, and trending TV with all the most popular apps and new features added automatically. Users are also able to control their Sharp Roku TV with the included voice remote and the Roku mobile app. Sharp Roku TV models are compatible with Apple AirPlay, Apple Home, Amazon Alexa, and Google Home devices for a unified smart home environment.

"We are pleased to be working with Roku to support our return to a US market as competitive as televisions," said Jim Sanduski, president of Sharp Home Electronics Company of America. "The immersive experience of our AQUOS OLED panel means our consumers will truly enjoy their Sharp Roku TV set to its fullest potential with the rich library of entertainment options and original content that Roku brings to our customers."

Sharp explained that the Sharp AQUOS OLED 4K UHD TVs boasts include these features:

• Dolby Vision IQ extends Dolby's HDR technology to improve the picture performance of Dolby Vision content according to the room's ambient light.
• High Dynamic Range (HDR10), a set of video encoding standards that makes colors vivid and maximizes contrast while minimizing the loss of data in bright or dark areas.
• Hybrid Log-Gamma (HLG), an HDR format that improves color reproduction and contrast for digital video broadcasting.
• The 30W (15W+15W) Speaker System and Dolby Atmos delivers an incredible depth of sound, clarity, and details for an experience you can feel all around you, even at lower volume settings.:
• Combined with a native 120Hz panel, Variable Refresh Rate (VRR) across all 4 HDMI inputs, enables the TV to adjust its refresh rate automatically in real-time to match the frame rate outputted by a video game console or PC.
• Auto Low Latency Mode (ALLM) switches off all motion processing features to minimize latency.

"We're excited to be a part of Sharp's return to the US television market at this pivotal time in the evolution of smart TV technology," said Tom McFarland, vice president of business development at Roku. "This provides a wonderful opportunity for customers to experience the stunning audiovisual capabilities of a Sharp OLED TV with Roku, America's #1 TV streaming platform, built in."

"We know consumers turn on televisions to experience their dreams across a variety of content," added Peter Weedfald, senior vice president of sales & marketing for Sharp Home Electronics Company of America.  "America's first Sharp Roku TV OLED 4K Ultra HD with HDR10 TVs with the full Roku TV experience built in smartly features both Dolby Vision IQ and Dolby Atmos technologies which truly makes your family's entertainment dreams come true."

Visit shop.sharpusa.com for more information on pricing and availability.

SAN JOSE, Calif.—TiVo has announced a multi-year, multi-million-unit deal with Sharp that will see the TV maker launch smart TVs Powered by TiVo. 

The first TVs using TiVo’s operating system and independent media platform are expected to ship in 2024 starting in Europe.

Sharp is the second major manufacturer to adopt the platform. During IFA 2022, Xperi announced the launch of its independent media platform and selected Vestel as its first original equipment manufacturer (OEM) partner as part of a push to make its technologies widely available in connected TVs and devices.

“We chose TiVo’s OS not only because of the superior product but also because we wanted to offer a user experience of Sharp quality elements with more variety and freedom,” said Nick Chen, head of Europe, vice president of TV-system business unit, Sharp Corporation. “We are excited to give users significantly more control on how to discover and consume content across live TV, news, sports, movies and more.”

“Sharp’s selection of Powered by TiVo is further proof that we are meeting a crucial need for smart TV brands,” said Jon Kirchner, chief executive officer, Xperi, which owns TiVo.. “The accelerated adoption of our independent media platform by consumer electronic brands, as well as by BMW in the car, lays a strong foundation for the future growth and success of our platform ecosystem.”

For more information on TiVo OS, visit https://business.tivo.com/products-solutions/tivo-os.

TiVo will be showcasing its independent media platform at IFA 2023 in Berlin.

IBC 2019, 13-17 September, Stand 7.A01: Cinegy, the global leader for broadcast playout software in the cloud, has announced that it will showcase the full scope of its 8K recording, capture, archive, and encoding capabilities during IBC 2019.

On its IBC stand, Cinegy will feature the eye-popping Sharp 8M-B80AX1E 8K displays, the first 80-inch 8K professional display to be mass produced. The Sharp 8M-B80AX1E has 33 million pixels (7680 x 4320), four times that of 4K UHD and sixteen times the resolution of full HD.

Cinegy CEO Jan Weigner said, “Earlier this year we announced that our entire software-defined television product range is now 8K capable. We had an opportunity to thoroughly test and confirm those capabilities on Sharp’s new 8K displays at their Hamburg offices.

“We connected a small PC running our Cinegy Player 3 software and played 8K clips that had been filmed by a Sharp 8K camera and the results were astonishing. I can confirm that Sharp’s 8K displays are the only ones to date that legitimately display a true 8K picture using existing NVIDIA graphics cards on a Cinegy software-powered PC or workstation.”

Peter Heins, Senior Product Manager, Visual Solutions, Sharp Information Systems Europe, further clarified, “We are proud to be working with Cinegy, showcasing our latest addition to Sharp’s 8K ecosystem. We are delivering on our vision to charge the world with 8K, offering resolution that transforms our ability to display reality and Cinegy is uniquely positioned to take advantage of this vision. The new 80-inch 8K display will support new and exciting business applications that rely on ultimate image precision and clarity, and we look forward to seeing the benefits of our collaboration with Cinegy.”

In addition to showcasing real-time 8K imagery on its stand, Cinegy will also feature other 8K-ready products that are expanding Cinegy software’s appeal in enterprise IT and professional AV markets.

Weigner added, “All of this is to clearly illustrate, rather than just talk about, the fact that working in 8K from end to end – in real time - has never been easier. Affordable 8K SDI cards are readily available, Sharp’s display is the current 8K benchmark, and our software, in combination with our Daniel2 GPU codec, eliminate any obstacles to 8K production. Furthermore, by bringing the Daniel2 codec to Adobe Premiere for Windows and Mac, we open up the world of 8K production to millions of existing Adobe users.”

Cinegy will demonstrate its 8K capabilities on in Hall 7, Stand A01 during IBC 2019. For more information, visit www.cinegy.com

###

About Cinegy
Cinegy develops software solutions for collaborative workflow encompassing IP, capture, editing and playout services tools, integrated into an active archive for full digital asset management. Either SaaS, virtualizable stacks, cloud or on-premises, Cinegy is COTS using standard IT hardware, and non-proprietary storage technology. Cinegy products are reliable, affordable, scalable, easily deployable and intuitive. Cinegy is truly Software Defined Television. Visit www.cinegy.com for more details.

About Sharp Information Systems Europe
Sharp Information Systems Europe (SISE) is a division of Sharp Electronics Europe, which offers a unique portfolio of award-winning document management and display solutions to help organisations transform the way they engage with information. Sharp’s industry-leading MFPs and large production systems sit at the heart of integrated applications for digital transformation, while our display solutions include innovative video walls, digital signage displays and interactive flat panel displays for collaborative presentations. Our mission is to develop new products that support individual expression; creating life enhancing experiences that let you be original. For more information, please visit www.sharp.eu


Cinegy PR Contact:
Jennie Marwick-Evans
Manor Marketing
jennie@manormarketing.tv
+44 (0) 7748 636171

MONTVALE, N.J.—Sharp is releasing the second generation of its 8K displays with the newly launched 8M-B80AX1U 80-inch UHD LCD model. Sharp says that its 8K UHD technology can reproduce hard to see details on the new display.

The 8M-B80AX1U meets the 8K UHD standard (7,680x4,320 pixels), allowing for pixel resolutions 16x that of Full HD and 4x of 4K. The display offers 800 cd/m2—up to 4,000 cd/m2 at peak level—which is more than the brightness of Sharp’s first generation of 8K displays. It also has more than five times more local dimming backlight zones for greater contrast between bright and dark areas.

There is also 10-Bit Extended Color Range that increases the range of possible color values in each pixel up to 1.07 billion colors. Other features include reduced motion blur during panning or movement and has 4x HDMI inputs to display native 8K content.

The 8M-B80AX1U is now available.

OSAKA, Japan—For the first time since 2015, U.S. customers will be able to purchase a Sharp designed and developed TV by the end of 2019. Sharp made the announcement as part of a new form of partnership with Hisense International American Investment Co.

Sharp left the U.S. market in 2015 due to troubled finances, signing a five-year licensing deal with Hisense. After being acquired by Foxconn in 2017, Sharp unsuccessfully attempted to buy back the brand. Sharp moved on to legal action, claiming patent violations and that Hisense was hurting the brand by marketing lesser-quality TVs. Sharp ended up dropping its legal actions in 2018.

This new partnership with Hisense brings the license back to Sharp, which says it plans to have its TVs available once again for U.S. customers in the second half of 2019.

In its official announcement, Sharp said it will “further accelerate transformation of its business to innovate the world with 8K/4K Ecosystem + 5G and AIoT.”

CES 2019 will be marked as the true debut of 8K television.

In Las Vegas, four TV makers — LG, Samsung, Sony and TCL — announced they'd be shipping 8K big screen models to North American retailers this year, like it or not, ready or not. Other brands, including Changhong, Hisense, Sharp and Skyworth, fronted their LVCC booths with 8K prototypes, likely waiting to gauge sales by the top tier brands before announcing their own U.S. 8K product plans.

8K ON DISPLAY AT 2019 CES

While there was boastful excitement amongst the 8K TV vendors in Las Vegas — several banded together at CES to form the 8K Alliance — excitement among retailers, the industry and consumers at large is questionable.

This lack of excitement is reflected by 8K sales forecasts. CTA projects than 200,000 8K TVs would be sold in the U.S. this year compared to projected sales of 22.2 million 4K sets, growing to a mere 1.5 million 8K units in 2022. But there are those who believe these and other similar 8K forecasts are optimistic. A couple of months ago, Samsung forecast North America 8K sales of just 100,000 units in 2019, and only 759,000 sets in 2022.

"8K [is] just another distraction encouraging customers to second guess that aspirational 4K purchase," opined Robert Cole, founder and CEO of Philadelphia-based World Wide Stereo. "My guys on the floor learned quickly not to lead with the 8K story. The presentation was more about it being future-proof with the best technology available. As more 8K TVs are released, the story will evolve."

“Considering there is no content for 8K at the moment and the technology hasn't been standardized, making the leap isn't for everyone,” agreed Jon Abt, co-president of Glenview, Ill.-based Abt Electronics, which has sold around a dozen of the first Samsung 8K model. "It's certainly at a very early adopter stage at the moment, but the upscaling from 4K is promising for today's buyers. There will be an influx of sets in 2019 at lower price points, which should open the market up.”

“We were one of two retailers in Texas to receive Samsung’s first 8K TV," said Kris Dybdahl, VP of Bjorn’s Audio Video. "We have sold one or two already to our early adopters. It looks great with the internal 8K demo content, as well as the up-converted content that we play on it on a daily basis.

"However, in a perfect world I wish the manufacturers would have held off a little while longer before trotting out 8K," Dybdahl continued. "By bringing 8K out so quickly after 4K, when most people still don’t have a 4K set yet, I think causes confusion in the customers mind — even the possibility of should I wait to see if there will be 16K?”

Here's a rundown of the 8K sets announced at CES and scheduled to go on sale this year:

LG: Five 8K models are coming from LG in the second half of 2019, with pricing likely coming in June: the 88-inch Z9 OLED, and four LCD-based NanoCell models — SM80, SM85, SM90 and SM95. All five LG 8K sets will be imbued with the company's ThinQ smart home platform and Google Assistant, DolbyVision HDR and LG's next-gen Alpha 9 processor designed to enhance up-conversion.

Samsung: First to market with 8K last fall, Samsung has already started pre-sales on four new QLED 8K models, all equipped with HDR10+, adaptive brightness and sound technologies, as well as Apple AirPlay 2 and iTunes support: a 65-inch ($4,999), 75-inch ($6,999), 82-inch ($9,999) and 85-inch ($14,999). Samsung also displayed a 98-inch QLED model, but with no word on when or how much.

Sony: The company silently debuted 85- and 98-inch versions of its XBR Master Series Z9G 8K Android TV LCD models. While both sets are already listed on the company's web site, there is no word on when or how much.

TCL: As its CES press event, TCL announced two models — a 75-inch Roku-enabled 8-Series set equipped with QLED and quantum contrast technologies and a Roku hardware reference design that TCL is the first to license, as well as the Q10 QLED Android TV. Only the Roku 8K model is scheduled to be sold in the U.S., however, but in what potential additional sizes, when and at what price TCL hasn't said. 

Pictured: LG's Z9 OLED

Allentown, Pa., may be a small city, but local television broadcaster WFMZ had big ideas when incorporating cutting-edge AV into its recent studio redesign. Unlike most traditional broadcast sets, WFMZ required that its set have the ability to stretch graphics and video content across multiple displays — without compromising on image quality — during a live broadcast. To build the unique and sophisticated video wall system the WFMZ team had in mind, they called on set-designers Devlin Design Group and integration firm Advanced.

“Our job was to build an AV infrastructure that has no limitations on configuring content across a range of displays from multiple manufacturers,” Advanced executive vice president Mark McPherson said. “We built a video wall system that successfully allows WFMZ to work with an infinite number of display layouts while using a 4K signal. Now, WFMZ is not limited by signal bandwidth in any capacity.”

[Read: Newsrooms Benefiting from Graphic Advances]

Advanced was able to achieve WFMZ’s desired flexibility by building the entire video wall system around a VuWall VuScape video wall controller, which allows the production team to seamlessly configure how display signals are distributed. For the display portion of the integration, Advanced built a six by three video wall using NEC 55-inch Ultra Narrow Bezel S-IPS Video Wall Displays. The video wall is flanked by several smaller displays, including LCD monitors from Sharp and LG. Advanced chose Extron DTP Transmitters and DTP Receivers to extend audio, video, and control.

“The most productive video walls offer simplicity and total flexibility with their content and this is where VuScape excels,” said Maryse Montagne, sales director for North America, VuWall. “Essentially, the video wall now becomes a single blank canvas that can display whatever sources the end user requires, in whatever size and orientation.”

“In order for the flexible content manipulation to work, all displays have to work in portrait or landscape mode,” McPherson commented. “The Advanced and Devlin Design Group technical teams designed the monitors so that they will toggle between the two modes on the fly — an element that is very unique to WFMZ’s broadcast studio.”

It was also imperative that production staff be able to easily configure the content across multiple displays. Conveniently, VuScape’s software includes a birds-eye layout representation of all of the monitors connected to the system. Producers can drag and drop content around to fit the best way across multiple screens. “This feature is an enormous benefit for producers responsible for distributing content on set,” McPherson commented. “It allows them to prepare the scenes before they go into production, which is unprecedented, and it enables them to test out how the image will appear before they go ahead with that configuration.”

According to Advanced vice president of engineering Kevin Linton, the most challenging aspect of the installation process involved the integration of several of the older technological components on set with the newer AV. Particularly, WFMZ wanted to control all presets and video wall layouts from its older, pre-existing production switch. For seamless control, Advanced had to integrate it with the Ross OverDrive system, a network-based control application.

“We had to draft a module to integrate their production switch with Ross and, in turn, control the video wall processor,” Linton commented. “Although it was a challenge, we were ultimately successful in making it work. This is the first time we were able to control the VuScape processor from a production switch.”

Ultimately, Advanced and Devlin Design Group were able to deliver on WFMZ’s request and, in doing so, built one of the most innovative video wall display systems in the broadcast industry. “The entire infrastructure is centered around distributing the highest quality graphics throughout the studio,” McPherson concluded. “We’re proud to provide WFMZ with cutting-edge video integration that is extremely innovative but is still hassle-free for staffers.”

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PHOENIX—Sharp Corporation used its late November National Dealer’s Meeting in Phoenix for the U.S. rollout of the first 8K, 60P Camcorder. The single Super35 sensor 8C-B60A, sporting 33 million pixels, records around 40 minutes to a removable Astrodesign 2TB SSD pack, with a 4TB SSD pack coming along soon.

The camera body weighs in at just over 10 pounds, but with accessories such as OLED viewfinder and PL mount lens, its use in the field weight is 26 pounds. A V-mount battery pack can power the camcorder for around an hour. A genlock input allows deployment in a multi-camera shoot. Frame rates available are 23.98, 24, 25, 29.97, 30, 50, 59.94, 60 Hz, and HDR (high dynamic range) is supported.

Recording to the SSD packs is lightly compressed using the Grass Valley HQX Codec. The camcorder can also output live, uncompressed 8K 60p video output at the same time as it is recording via its Quadlink 12G-SDI output. (4K and HD outputs are provided.) The camcorder can be used as a playback device from the SSD packs.

As far as audio goes, the 8C-B60A provides a pair of 3-pin XLRs for line or mic level input, and a 5-pin mic input. MADI audio can be input via a BNC. Headphone is a stereo mini-jack and there’s a monaural speaker built into the camera body.

The 8K camcorder fits into “an 8K eco-system that Sharp is developing,” said Sharp Executive Vice President Yoshihisa Ishida. “From shooting to image generation, we have products and technologies in that total system.” At the dealer event, the company also premiered its AQUOS 8K series, the first range of consumer-ready televisions and monitors

The first of the 8K camcorders will be delivered to NHK in about a year. In addition to broadcast television and motion picture uses of the camcorder, Sharp also identified medical, military and civilian surveillance, and training among target markets for the product. Cost (excluding lens) is estimated at $80,000.