GRAND ALLIANCE

In the early days of developing our HDTV systems companies were asked to compete with each other in determining what system would be used for transmission of the signal. By 1993 it became clear that no one company could provide a solution that was acceptable to all. On 24 May of that year a Grand Alliance was formed by four of the principle competitors. Included in this alliance were the ATRC, AT&T, General Instruments, and Zenith. The ARTC (Advanced Television Research Consortium) included CCDC (Channel Compatible DigiCipher), Compression Labs, NBC, North American Philips, the David Sarnoff Research Center, and Thomson Consumer Electronics. The Grand Alliance initially proposed an HDTV system supporting two formats, 720p and 960i. The 960i number was changed to 1080i by October '93. That was also the point where Dolby Digital was added to the specification for audio.