Sensio lands big 3-D licence contract
Montreal’s Sensio Technologies Inc. announced Wednesday it secured a patent licensing agreement with Samsung for its technology to be used in 3-D televisions.
The deal allows Samsung – the world’s largest television maker – to convert 3-D images to standard mode. The feature, known as Sensio S2D Switch, is useful for when a large group of people is watching a 3-D program and there are not enough 3-D glasses to share, or if people are not comfortable watching 3-D programs. Samsung currently uses the method in all of its 3-D televisions.
“It’s the most lucrative licensing deal that we’ve signed so far,” said Nicholas Routhier, president and CEO of Sensio. “This is very exciting for us. We’ve been talking about this for a long time, but these deals take time to sign. Now finally, our investors and customers can see that we’re not just talking.”
The financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Routhier explained that securing the deal was deli- cate work because Samsung was already using the method without paying Sensio for the patent. Sensio is still hoping to licence its 3-D compression technology called Sensio HiFi 3-D, to Samsung and other leading television manufacturers. Sensio is also pursuing other screen manufacturers who are using its patent.
This is Sensio’s second major licensing deal with a television manufacturer. The company also has a licensing agreement in place with screen company Vizio on both its S2D Switch feature, and its 3-D compression tech- nology.
Later this year, Sensio will start selling 3-D programming directly to televisions that connect to the Internet and use Sensio 3-D compression. The video on demand store, called 3DGO!, will have more than 100 titles in its library by the end of the year, the company said.
Sensio’s share price rose 20.55 per cent Wednesday for a 7.5 cent gain, closing at 44 cents.