InterDigital, Technical University of Munich, and Interhaptics Technologies Tapped for New MPEG Haptics Standard

Selected technologies lay critical foundation for emerging haptics market

WILMINGTON, Del., Jan. 04, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — InterDigital, Inc. (NASDAQ: IDCC), Interhaptics, a software company specializing in haptics, and the Technical University of Munich (TUM) have been tapped to contribute their technologies to a new industry standard around haptics. The International Organization for Standardization and International Electrotechnical Commission (ISO/IEC) MPEG group selected the technologies for an emerging standard around haptic data representation and coding. Specifically, Interhaptics’ encoding architecture was selected for quality perceptual performances, TUM’s wavelet coding technology was selected for its support of encoding haptics for high frequency bands, and InterDigital’s integration layer and user body coding were selected for their compatibility with existing and emerging multimedia standards and support for future evolutions of immersive media.

The selection of these technologies represents a critical step in developing the industry standards that will shape the emerging haptics market. In June 2021, MPEG issued the first Call for Proposal around haptics to identify the reference architecture around which the future haptics standards should be developed, and on which future technologies will be based. The array of submitted encoding proposals were evaluated by a pool of unbiased experts, who later synthesized the most promising characteristics of each proposal to shape the final standard.

MPEG’s first standard around haptics draws heavily from proposals from InterDigital, TUM, and Interhaptics. TUM contributed a wavelet coding technology for encoding high frequency bands, and Interhaptics’ proposal exhibited superior compression and encoding technologies to enable haptics signals to be stored and delivered. InterDigital’s dual contribution provides the compatibility layer allowing haptic effects to be integrated and represented, within 2D and 3D multimedia frameworks, as well as the coding techniques to support future immersive and interactive applications.

“We are honored to contribute InterDigital’s integration layer technology to serve as the basis for critical industry standards in this exciting field of haptics,” said Philippe Guillotel, Director, InterDigital. “In multimedia, standards are the common language our industry uses to communicate, and encoding standards are the core around which our value chain is modeled. We recognize the true impact and responsibility of this MPEG selection.”

“The haptics market is missing today a vibrant community of creators designing memorable experiences for the end-user. This is the mission of Interhaptics,” says Eric Vezzoli, Interhaptics CEO. “The MPEG haptics encoding standards are a stepping stone towards this goal. We are happy to collaborate with InterDigital and TUM to unlock the value of Haptics for the whole ecosystem.”

“We are thrilled to contribute to the reference model technology in this very important and new field of haptics” said Andreas Noll of TUM. “Through the integration of technologies from the three proponents, we are able to deliver performance and flexibility for a wide variety of use cases. The developed architecture is well capable of evolving into a solid standard, and the combination of coding methods from InterHaptics and TUM promises to deliver the best of both approaches.”

Looking ahead, InterDigital, TUM, and Interhaptics plan to collaborate within the MPEG framework to update and integrate the newly developed reference model within haptics standardization efforts. The three parties have committed to work together to improve the reference model and finalize specifications around haptics throughout 2022.

About InterDigital ^®

InterDigital develops mobile and video technologies that are at the core of devices, networks, and services worldwide. We solve many of the industry’s most critical and complex technical challenges, inventing solutions for more efficient broadband networks, better video delivery, and richer multimedia experiences years ahead of market deployment. InterDigital has licenses and strategic relationships with many of the world’s leading technology companies. Founded in 1972, InterDigital is listed on NASDAQ.

InterDigital is a registered trademark of InterDigital, Inc.

For more information, visit: www.InterDigital.com 

About Interhaptics

Interhaptics is a software company specialized in haptics. Interhaptics provides hand interactions and haptic feedback development and deployment tools for the metaverse, mobile and console applications. Interhaptics’ mission is to enable the growth of a scalable haptics ecosystem through haptics standardization, cross technology and cross platform deployment.

For more information, visit www.Interhaptics.com 

About TUM

The Technical University of Munich (TUM) is one of Europe’s leading research universities, with more than 600 professors, 48,000 students, and 11,000 academic and non-academic staff. Its focus areas are the engineering sciences, natural sciences, life sciences and medicine, combined with economic and social sciences. TUM acts as an entrepreneurial university that promotes talents and creates value for society. In that it profits from having strong partners in science and industry. It is represented worldwide with the TUM Asia campus in Singapore as well as offices in Beijing, Brussels, Mumbai, San Francisco, and São Paulo. Nobel Prize winners and inventors such as Rudolf Diesel, Carl von Linde, and Rudolf Mößbauer have done research at TUM. In 2006, 2012, and 2019 it won recognition as a German “Excellence University.” In international rankings, TUM regularly places among the best universities in Germany.

InterDigital Contact:
Roya Stephens
Email: Roya.Stephens@interdigital.com
+1 (202) 349-1714

Interhaptics Contact:
Dr. Eric Vezzoli
Email: ev@interhaptics.com

TUM Contact:
Andreas Noll
Email: andreas.noll@tum.de