As consumer demand for digital technologies and experiences continues to expand in all directions, telecommunications providers are seeking creative ideas that can provide relief for their increasingly strained infrastructure. Semiconductor solutions specialist Entropic Communications believes it may have found an answer following a recent patent acquisition involving satellite broadcasting components.

With traditional broadcast, broadband and mobile connectivity converging on the modern home in the form of everything from HDTV to tablet-based video streaming, content providers are facing stiff competition for bandwidth. But following its latest acquisition of cabling patents from integrated circuit company PLX Technologies, Entropic engineers believe they can essentially consolidate this digital traffic - and its underlying infrastructure - by converting satellite broadcast signals to the same Internet Protocol standard utilized by PCs, laptops and smartphones.

"We currently deliver the largest product portfolio for single cable technologies, supporting [direct broadcast satellite] operators worldwide," said Entropic senior vice president Vinay Gokhale. "We are optimistic our newly acquired assets will provide a path to future technologies, ultimately leading toward highly integrated products that incorporate broadband capture and IP output."

The semiconductor solutions industry has proven to be fertile ground for IP transitions, according to Solid State Technology. Part of the progress has been attributed to differential licensing frameworks, which have helped spread out the cost of popular system-on-a-chip (SoC) designs that many feared were becoming prohibitively expensive to acquire.