 Founded in 1951, Scientific Atlanta has evolved
into one of the leading providers of end-to-end networks
used by programmers, broadcasters, and cable, telecom,
wireless and satellite service providers around the world.
The company is widely recognized for its expertise in video
delivery, which many view as an art as much as it is a
science.
As we pass the midpoint of the first decade of a new
century, the rapid convergence of technologies and markets
(cable, wireline, mobile and “over the top” video) is
driving service providers to transition from offering
connectivity, to becoming “experience providers.” They offer
rich, personalized, on-demand, multi-media services that
meet the consumer’s desire for what they want, when, how,
and where they want it. Because video is a strategic
application in the service provider
voice/video/data/mobility bundle of consumer entertainment,
communication and online services, Cisco acquired Scientific
Atlanta in February 2006.
Scientific Atlanta’s rich heritage of innovation reaches
back into the early 1950s when the company began in suburban
Atlanta.
1950s – 1960s
In its early days, Scientific Atlanta was a very diverse
company, manufacturing a wide range of products including
electronic test equipment for antennas and electronics,
plastic injection molded food and beverage packaging, and
electronics equipment cabinets. The US Government and NASA
were two of the company’s primary customers during our first
two decades. We played an integral role in helping NASA
establish its ground stations for communications with
astronauts orbiting the planet and on the moon, and helped
test the two-way communications equipment used by Project
Mercury, Gemini and Apollo astronauts.
1970s
By 1972 sales to the up-and-coming cable television industry
had grown to 15 percent of total revenues and pioneering
landmark events for Scientific Atlanta and cable providers
were imminent.
At the NCTA’s National Show in 1973, Scientific Atlanta
teamed with Teleprompter Corporation, the nation’s largest
cable operator at the time, and a little known pay channel
called Home Box Office (HBO) to demonstrate the
cable/satellite interconnection. The live boxing match
delivered to the HBO customer party was over in only two
minutes and meant little to the boxing world, but those
short on-air moments marked the beginning of
satellite-delivered programming for the cable industry.
Things progressed into 1974 and 1975 when Scientific Atlanta
was asked by RCA and HBO to help them launch a new cable
service. Scientific Atlanta installed earth stations at
cable systems in Mississippi and Florida, RCA provided the
satellite transponders, and HBO provided the programming,
the Ali/Frazier “Thrilla in Manila” heavyweight championship
bout. Viewers witnessed the launch of the first
satellite-delivered cable television service as we know it
today. This innovative programming delivery breakthrough
provided the momentum that has resulted in the hundreds of
channels of programming available today.
1980s
As the 1980s dawned, Scientific Atlanta was under the
leadership of eventual Cable Hall of Fame inductee and
industry pioneer Sid Topol. Topol’s vision of the cable
industry of the future and the role of the set-top were
expressed in a 1982 interview with CableVision magazine
where he said:
“..I think eventually there are going to be three boxes in
the home. The three boxes may be incorporated all in one big
box…the addressable 100-channel set-top terminal with
tiering and pay-per-view…an interactive terminal for
shopping, banking, security and that sort of thing...a modem
which interconnects the cable system with personal computers
— at high speed.”
Today, Scientific Atlanta’s digital interactive set-tops
deliver all of the services Topol foresaw, plus digital
video recording.
Throughout the 1980s, Scientific Atlanta’s ties to the cable
industry strengthened. Our first set-tops, known as cable
converters in their early days, began to expand their role
in our product mix. Delivering 54 channels in 1980, by 1983
our Model 8500 could support 128 channels. Satellite
delivery of programming began to expand and we sold our
first satellite encoders in 1985 to a customer in Australia.
Always on the leading edge of innovation, Scientific Atlanta
deployed an analog high-definition system in Canada in 1989,
nearly two decades before digital HD service became popular.
1990s
Jim McDonald’s leadership of Scientific Atlanta began in
1993 as the company began to expand its leadership role in
our development of the cable industry’s future – the
interactive digital network. We launched the PowerVu®
digital compression system in 1995, sponsored the 1996
Summer Olympic Games in Atlanta, and established our
Sugarloaf corporate campus in 1997, the same year we rolled
out our first digital set-top, the Explorer® 2000™.
Manufacturing moved to Juarez and the Scientific Atlanta
Foundation was established as the company headed toward a
new millennium.
2000s
With the pace of our business at an all time high, sales
topped two billion dollars in 2001 as digital technology
began to spread across cable systems. In just a short time,
the company has helped launch hundreds of digital cable
systems, shipped more than 30 million digital set-tops,
become a leader in the cable modem business and helped to
pioneer the rollout of digital video recorder (DVR),
high-definition (HD) and Video on Demand (VOD) services for
cable operators.
The acquisition of BarcoNet (Europe) helped established
Scientific Atlanta as a major player in the global video,
voice and data marketplace, and the completion of our
Atlanta campus helped to focus the talents of our people as
never before. Now, poised to continue its video delivery
leadership by helping telecom operators launch IP television
service, Scientific Atlanta is expanding its reputation as a
company where “Innovation Never Stops.”
Scientific Atlanta Today
The sun never really sets on Scientific Atlanta. At any give
time, our people, our products and systems, or the customers
we serve are busy delivering reliable entertainment,
information and communications experiences to millions of
consumers around the world.
The portion of the market that we serve is best described as
“network-delivered services.” In general, these services
don’t involve the physical distribution of consumable
products. Instead, services are provided to consumers over
optical and electronic networks. Since the mid-1990s, the
delivery of these services has undergone tremendous change —
from analog to high-definition digital video systems, from
broadcast to on-demand services, and from a single service
to bundled entertainment, information and communications
services. We serve these markets indirectly by providing the
products and professional services that allow our customers
to deliver services to consumers.
Network-delivered services are growing rapidly in the United
States and around the world. Consumer interest in on-demand
television services, higher resolution video content,
high-speed data and voice over Internet protocol (VoIP)
services is strong. And, as technological change
accelerates, service providers that previously delivered one
or two services are now seeking to offer many services over
a single network.
Our in-home products and end-to-end video, voice and data
delivery networks are helping service providers deliver the
services consumers want – DVR, HD, VOD, high-speed data, IP
television and voice over IP (VoIP) service. In addition,
our decades of video delivery experience make us a preferred
choice for systems integration support when service
providers create new networks, launch new services or
enhance the capabilities of existing networks.
Digital video recorders have become very popular with
consumers, and according to Forrester Research, over 28
million U.S. households are expected to have DVRs by 2008.
Increasingly, consumers around the world choose Voice over
Internet Protocol technology, which offers significantly
more features, often at a lower price.
Today’s consumers demand choices: they expect a bundle of
video, data and voice services at attractive prices, and
they want them now. To meet those demands, service providers
also need choices — the types of service delivery choices
Scientific Atlanta can provide. Increasingly, our customers
rely on us to help them take advantage of consumer demand,
while improving their competitive position.
The Cisco/Scientific Atlanta Advantage
Cisco provides leading-edge thinking about what companies
and countries can achieve with networked communications and
IT. We have also had a unique ability to anticipate
transitions in the marketplace and build the products and
services to enable these transitions. The combination of
Cisco and Scientific Atlanta fills an important void in a
key market transition as video, data, voice and mobility
converge and our customers begin to transition to delivering
an entertainment, information or communications experience
rather than seeing themselves as merely providing access to
a service. Together, we have a unique opportunity to capture
this next wave in networking and communications as the
market transitions to integrated services offerings. |
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