V-Nova Announces Licensing Terms for V-Nova LCEVC

V-Nova LCEVC license is entirely free for integration by chipset manufacturers, operating systems, browsers for in-house development, and encoder vendors.

FREMONT, CA: V-Nova, a provider of video compression solutions, announces licensing terms for V-Nova LCEVC, a software development kit and reference integrations that add MPEG-5 Part 2 LCEVC (Low Complexity Enhancement Video Coding) ISO/IEC 23094-2 encoding and decoding to any video delivery workflow, device or application. The licensing terms have been developed together with customers and key players and reflect the betterment nature of LCEVC and a modern method to licensing, akin to that of software services where operators pay as they benefit from a given technology. The result is license fees that are either free or low-cost.

V-Nova LCEVC – including both IP Rights and software products – is available for Entertainment Video Services with two licensing types. Its Integration License is free and allows device or chipset manufacturers, operating systems, browsers, in-house development, and encoder/player vendors to integrate V-Nova LCEVC encoding and decoding libraries. The Usage License is priced by service size, measured through the total number of users.  Above a lower free threshold, the cost per user is calculated according to volume and capped at $3.7mn per year.

 V-Nova LCEVC is the industry’s first highly optimized deployment of MPEG-5 Part 2 LCEVC, the codec-agnostic ISO/IEC enhancement standard capable of offering higher quality at up to 40 percent lower bitrates than codecs used natively. Its unique low-complexity design immediately boosts encoding by up to 4x via a simple software upgrade, producing vital transcoding cost efficiencies. Importantly, it delivers a corresponding reduction of carbon emissions per hour of video, offering relevant environmental sustainability advantages to video workflows. LCEVC enables service providers to enhance the quality of their services, their customer reach and reduce their operating costs.  

The rapid release of the LCEVC product, followed in quick succession by our low-complexity licensing terms, comes in response to the strong interest in LCEVC. Following extensive consultation with customers and key industry players, the company chooses not to charge any fees to hardware manufacturers, operating systems, browsers, and other ecosystem enablers to facilitate adoption at scale, also via software upgrades of existing devices.