Euclid Discoveries

Euclid Discoveries announces the expansion of its engineering and development teams

Anne Marsden — Thu, 17 Jan 2013 17:03:08 +0000

With the addition of a Director of Software Development, a Sr. Software Design Engineer, a Sr. Architect, and an Algorithmic Engineer, Euclid continues to build its video processing and compression technology development capabilities.

Euclid is pleased to announce the following appointments to the engineering and development teams:

Dane Kottke, PhD – Director of Software Development.
Dr. Kottke brings 20 years of video and signal processing experience to Euclid’s development team. Recently, Dr. Kottke was at Avid and focused on algorithm development and technical specifications for video codecs and architecture. During this time he was responsible for the oversight of video codecs for H.264, MPEG-2, JPEG-2000 and VC-1. His areas of expertise include video compression architecture, optimization, performance analysis and quality control. Dr. Kottke earned a PhD in Electrical Engineering from the University of Rhode Island.

John Minton – Sr. Software Design Engineer.
Mr. Minton has over twenty five years software engineering experience in all aspects of architecture, design, implementation, troubleshooting, and deployment of software on everything from embedded to distributed, enterprise-class systems. His extensive multi-discipline background encompasses the areas of streaming video transport, telephony/VoIP, networking, messaging and data-driven applications. In his past experience, Mr. Minton has worked for a number of companies in the areas of networking, cryptography, video processing, and defense. Mr. Minton holds a BA in Anthropology from Louisiana State University.

John Guo – PhD, Senior Architect.
Dr. Guo joins Euclid Discoveries as a Senior Architect within the research area of the company. In his most recent role at Reliance MediaWorks, Dr. Guo performed image processing to enhance images for the movie industry. He has extensive experience in algorithm development, coding and testing of video codecs, working extensively with the MPEG-4 and MPEG-2 standards. Dr. Guo received his PhD in Electrical Engineering from the University of Southern California.

Donald Pian – PhD, Algorithmic Engineer
Dr. Pian brings to Euclid more than 25 years of experience in multimedia processing and compression. He played a major role in developing the Qualcomm digital cinema and multimedia products based on the ABSDCT technology. Prior to Qualcomm, Dr. Pian’s work at Divio focused on MPEG-4 video compression algorithms, rate control, scene change detection, color space conversion, deringing and deblocking, as well as the design and implementation of digital filters for decimation, interpolation and noise reduction. His work for companies including Imedia Corporation, STMicrolectronics and Dolby, centered on MPEG-2 video encoding and re-encoding, development of microprocessors for multimedia applications and video pre-processing, variable bit rate encoding and digital cinema watermarking. Dr. Pian earned his PhD in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at MIT.

“We are excited about the team we’ve brought together,” said Euclid Discoveries CEO, Richard Wingard. “These engineers and mathematicians are building the next generation of video processing and compression technology and their combined experience and vision are key to our continued advancements and success.”

About Euclid Discoveries:
Euclid Discoveries is a video technology development company focused on the delivery of HD video over constrained networks. For over a decade Euclid has been tackling this challenge and has invented an innovative technology that delivers significant benefits in video distribution.

The company’s patented technology utilizes object modeling to deliver improved video compression with no loss of visual quality. Until now, the company’s technology has been operating exclusively on a proprietary codec. During the course of the company’s research and development, it was discovered that certain components of the technology could operate entirely within the H.264 environment, delivering compression and video quality enhancements.

To learn more about Euclid Discoveries and its video processing technology, please contact us at info@eucliddiscoveries.com.

Euclid Discoveries receives its first patent grant in South Korea.

Anne Marsden — Thu, 03 Jan 2013 15:00:33 +0000

This newest grant strengthens Euclid’s portfolio and is the foreign counterpoint to the company’s U.S. granted patent 7,457,472. The patent covers generation of an object-based encoding for video processing applications. Specifically, an object is detected in video data and correspondence models are generated from the detected object, aiding video compression. Spectral, texture, and motion segmentation are employed.

Euclid continues to rigorously protect its video processing inventions with its recent filing of another patent application. This latest application relates to modeling data at multiple fidelities and uses higher-level modeling to provide an efficient way of navigating more of the prediction search space to produce better predictions.

With this newest grant, Euclid Discoveries has 28 granted patents in the US and internationally. The company also has an additional 21 patents pending.

“Euclid Discovereies continues to press the boundaries of video processing and compression technology,” said Euclid’s CEO, Richard Wingard. “We are excited and proud of our advancements and continue to advance the field of object and feature-based video processing.”

About Euclid Discoveries:

Euclid Discoveries is a video technology development company focused on the delivery of HD video over constrained networks. For the past 12 years Euclid has been tackling this challenge and has invented an innovative technology that delivers significant benefits in video distribution.

The company’s patented technology utilizes object modeling to deliver improved video compression with no loss of visual quality. Until now, the company’s technology has been operating exclusively on a proprietary codec. During the course of the company’s research and development, it was discovered that certain components of the technology could operate entirely within the H.264 standard, delivering compression and video quality enhancements.

To learn more about Euclid Discoveries and its video processing technology, please watch our video or contact us at info@eucliddiscoveries.com.

Euclid Discoveries Announces Video Compression Technology Advancements

Sydney Graham — Tue, 11 Dec 2012 21:50:58 +0000

Euclid Discoveries announces that its EuclidVision video compression technology is now playable in any media player with a standard H.264 decoder.

With today’s announcement, the company is able to provide EuclidVision video compression on H.264 codecs, which is the present state of the art for media players. “This is an exciting development in the commercialization of our technology,” says Richard Wingard, Euclid CEO. “We now have the ability to enable part of our technology in today’s encoding process, and to demonstrate compression and quality gains to media players with standard H.264 decoders. While this was not our primary objective, this new development allows current video processing technology to take advantage of some of EuclidVision’s advanced model-based techniques.”

Initial testing results for this deployment have demonstrated bandwidth reductions of 5-20% for high motion, high complexity HD videos, the type of videos where EuclidVision’s advanced model-based techniques perform best. Another benefit of the EuclidVision technology is its ability to improve visual quality of high motion, high complexity videos without increasing bandwidth consumption. The company is continuing to work on ways to deliver additional bandwidth reductions and visual quality improvements in this environment.

In the months to come, Euclid will continue to improve its H.264-based compression technology while also integrating EuclidVision algorithms within MPEG-2 and HEVC (H.265) compliant streams. Together, this suite of capabilities will enable EuclidVision to enhance the video experience of users over a wide variety of devices and applications.

The company is actively pursuing potential partners who can commercially benefit from these extended capabilities, and will be demonstrating its capabilities during the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, January 8-10, 2013.

About Euclid Discoveries:

To learn more about Euclid Discoveries and its video processing technology, contact us at info@eucliddiscoveries.com.

Riding Bandwidth to a Billion Dollars

Richard Wingard — Tue, 11 Dec 2012 15:00:10 +0000

By focusing on the video production end of the business, are companies like Amazon, Apple & Time Warner missing the next billion dollar business? Read More

Euclid Discoveries Announces New Appointments and Organizational Changes

Anne Marsden — Tue, 20 Nov 2012 14:38:34 +0000

Effective immediately, Euclid Discoveries has made 3 appointments to acknowledge the contributions and responsibilities of key personnel.

Nigel Lee, Ph.D., previously Euclid’s Chief Algorithmic Engineer, has been appointed as the company’s Chief Science Officer. Darin DeForest, Ph.D., has been promoted to Director of Software Development. DeForest’s previous role was Lead Algorithmic Software Engineer.Anne Watelet has been promoted to Director of Operations. Prior to this position Watelet was the company’s Knowledge manager.

“These changes were made to acknowledge the roles and added responsibilities of these key personnel”, said Richard Wingard. “We are making significant advancements in our technology and we continue to ensure the protection of our IP through the patent process. Nigel, Darin and Anne are doing pivotal work in these areas and their new positions reflect that work.”

Please take a moment to wish our folks well in their continued contributions to Euclid’s development.

Digital Video Compression: Comparing Video Compression Performance Of Different Video Codecs

Donald Pian — Thu, 15 Nov 2012 18:01:52 +0000

Donald is a PhD and Algorithmic Engineer for Euclid. In an earlier article, he wrote about how video compression is measured. In this post, Donald looks at one objective measurement of the video compression performance: Peak Signal to Noise Ratio (PSNR)

Compression Measurement Explained

Donald Pian — Tue, 30 Oct 2012 13:57:55 +0000

In the era of increasing video consumption and decreasing spectrum for the mobile market all eyes are on the new standard and the promise of smaller file sizes and decreased bandwidth usage. As people talk about bandwidth, bitrates and video quality, we thought it would be a good idea to explain how to measure video compression and how to compare the encoding performance of the new standard H.265 to the current standard H.264. Read More

Patent Wars & The Innovation Impact

Richard Wingard — Thu, 18 Oct 2012 14:21:30 +0000

After all of the recent headlines surrounding Apple, Samsung and a settlement with way too many zeros, I started to reflect on what these suits do to innovation and the true impact on the consumer. Read More

Recent Changes to U.S. Patent Law Under the AIA

Anne Watelet — Tue, 09 Oct 2012 14:00:28 +0000

Large companies are spending a lot of time and money surrounding patent infringement and recent changes in patent laws are putting a twist on what companies can do. These new laws come with a hefty price tag though, so we pay close attention to the risks and costs associated with protecting our Intellectual Property. The following is a report provided by our IP attorneys, Kenyon and Kenyon, that we thought you might also find useful and enlightening.

Recent Changes to U.S. Patent Law Under the AIA

Marking the one-year anniversary of the Leahy-Smith America Invents Act (“AIA”) was the implementation of some of the most prominent reforms to patent legislation in almost a century. In total, seven new provisions went into effect on September 16, 2012 by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (“PTO”). These key changes include:

Inter Partes Review – which replaces inter partes reexaminations, and allows a third-party to institute a challenge of the patent so long as it is determined that there is a reasonable likelihood that the challenger will prevail with respect to at least one of the challenged claims.[i]
Post Grant Review – only applies to those patents granted under the first-inventor-to-file system, which is scheduled to take effect as of March 16, 2013, and allows a third-party to challenge a petition as unpatentable on a wider variety of grounds than those available for an inter partes review.[ii]
Transitional Program for Covered Business Method Patents – available only for a person that has been sued for infringement of a particular business method patent. The petition for a transitional program proceeding must show that it is more likely than not that at least one of the challenged claims is unpatentable.[iii]
Supplemental Examination – enables applicants to provide additional information that may assist the patentee in avoiding inequitable conduct claims during prosecution.[iv]
Third-Party Preissuance Submissions – permits a third-party to submit any patents, published patent applications, or other relevant publications for consideration during the examination of the patent application at issue. A brief description of relevance for each submission must be included.[v]
Citation of Prior Art and Written Statements in Patent Files – provides that a third-party or a patent owner may submit statements made by the patent owner before the PTO or a federal court relating to the patent claims.[vi]
Inventor’s Oath or Declaration – allows assignees to file a patent application on the inventor’s behalf.[vii]

While there are many interesting components of the latest rules employed by the PTO, perhaps the two that have attracted the greatest attention are the new Inter Partes Review (“IPR”) and Post-Grant Review (“PGR”). These two proceedings, each possessing their own procedural nuances, are a way for a third-party Requester to challenge the patentability of an invention.

Both an IPR and PGR can only be initiated by a person who is not the owner of a patent and has not previously filed a civil action challenging the validity of a claim of the patent. Certain statutory requirements must be met when filing these petitions, which include the timing for when an IPR and PGR petition must be brought. For example, an IPR petition shall be filed after the later of: (1) nine months after the grant or reissue of a patent, or (2) the date of the termination of any PGR. A PGR petition, however, must be filed on or before the date that is nine months after the grant or reissue of a patent.

Another important aspect of these post-grant proceedings is the specific grounds upon which an IPR and PGR may be brought. More limited in scope, an IPR petitioner may only seek to cancel claims of a patent under 35 U.S.C. § 102, relating to novelty, and § 103, relating to non-obviousness, as based upon prior art consisting of patents and printed publications. A PGR petitioner, however, may institute a patent review on the same grounds as recited for an IPR, and the additional grounds of an on-sale or public use bar under § 102, unpatentable subject matter under § 101, and the written description and enablement requirements under § 112.

In accordance with the AIA, the PTO has also significantly altered its current fee schedule for these two proceedings, with the prescribed fees for filing an IPR and PGR ranging from $27,000 to $36,000, respectively. Although these fees are noticeably higher than the previous fee of approximately $8,800 for filing an inter partes reexamination (“IPX”), one justification may be that these proceedings are expected to be resolved much faster and, therefore, at a much lower cost to the parties than a typical patent litigation. In contrast to the unpredictable length and nature of federal court proceedings, the newly formed Patent Trial and Appeal Board (which has replaced the former Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences, and is responsible for governing all IPR and PGR proceedings) must issue a decision within 18-months from the date that an IPR or PGR is filed. Tellingly, though, a recent report depicting the amount of IPXs filed in the beginning of September 2012, just prior to the enactment these new provisions, illustrates a drastic increase in the amount of IPX requests filed during the two weeks leading up to the change from IPXs to IPRs on September 16, 2012.[viii] Whether or not this indicates an underlying dissatisfaction with the changeover is a matter of speculation, at best.

What is clear, though, are the estoppel parameters established under these proceedings. Once the PTAB renders a final written decision in an IPR or PGR, the petitioner is estopped from going before the PTO, the International Trade Commission, or a district court, based on any invalidity ground that the petitioner previously raised or reasonably could have raised. A petitioner may, however, appeal the PTAB’s decision to the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.

Due to the particularities of each of these IPR and PGR proceedings, it is important that patentees and patent challengers alike understand the risks and benefits associated with this new aspect of the patent review system under the AIA. Looking forward, though, it is evident that there are even more changes poised to affect the patent landscape. Arguably, the most momentous change of all will be realized on March 16, 2013, when all patents filed after that date will be subject to the new first-to-file rules of priority. Once that occurs, discussions concerning IPR and PGR proceedings, as well as a multitude of other patent reforms under the AIA, will undoubtedly have to be examined anew in light of the PTO’s transformations.

[i] Changes to implement the inter partes review process are available at: http://www.uspto.gov/aia_implementation/fr_specific_trial.pdf.

[ii] Changes to implement the post-grant review process are available at: http://www.uspto.gov/aia_implementation/fr_specific_trial.pdf.

[iii] Changes to implement the transitional program for covered business method patents are available at: http://www.uspto.gov/aia_implementation/fr_specific_trial.pdf.

[iv] Changes to implement the supplemental examination provisions are available at: http://www.uspto.gov/aia_implementation/fr_supp_exam.pdf.

[v] Changes to implement the preissuance submissions of third parties are available at: http://www.uspto.gov/aia_implementation/120707-preissuance_submission_fr.pdf.

[vi] Changes to implement the citation of prior art are available at: http://www.uspto.gov/aia_implementation/citation_of_prior_art_fr.pdf.

[vii] Changes to implement the inventor’s oath or declaration provisions are available at: http://www.uspto.gov/aia_implementation/fr_inventor_oath.pdf.

[viii] The chart illustrating the Inter Partes Reexamination Requests Filed Each Month is available at: http://www.patentlyo.com/patent/2012/09/my-entry.html?cid=6a00d8341c588553ef017c32033e84970b

Going Mobile: An Issue of Video Quality and Bandwidth

Dave Walker — Thu, 27 Sep 2012 15:32:46 +0000

Today's promise is that LTE technology in cellular networks and the next iteration of MPEG compression, H.265/HEVC, will bring a smooth seamless video experience to the mobile user, but will it? Read More