Arkados Showcases Versatile Solutions for HomePlug Product Designs

New “Product Blueprints” Help Consumer Electronics Companies Build Products More Quickly at a Lower Cost
2007 International CES

PISCATAWAY, N.J.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Arkados (OTCBB: AKDS), known as “The HomePlug® Applications Company,” today announced an updated portfolio of “product blueprints” – known in the industry as “reference designs” – for a wide variety of audio and video products for the connected home. Arkados customers are showcasing many of these reference designs, each of which incorporates Arkados semiconductors and embedded software, in their booths at the 40th Annual Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas.

Arkados customers will be able to easily and quickly base their own products on these reference designs. Designed in compliance with HomePlug standards for powerline communications technology, final electronics products that incorporate the Arkados chip will be extraordinarily easy for consumers to set up and use. Along with an embedded ARM processor core, each reference design demonstrates the extraordinary flexibility of Arkados solutions and highlights the rich complementary product features that are easily and cost-effectively enabled in the design process.

The Arkados Direct-to-Speaker™ reference designs for audio include the following solutions:

* Arkados Direct-to-Speaker MFi iPod Dock creates whole-house music from the world’s most popular digital music player
* Arkados Direct-to-Speaker Audio Receivers receive audio content and can display data (such as song title and artist information) and relay controls sent to the music source from any location
* Arkados Direct-to-Speaker Internet Radio is a HomePlug-certified reference design that can tune into internet radio stations without the use of a computer
* Arkados Direct-to-Speaker Virtual Audio Driver runs on Windows® platforms and adds an audio device driver, allowing users to transport audio to locations around the whole house
* Arkados Direct-to-Speaker Low-Latency Audio Transport is for applications such as intercoms, remote subwoofers and public announcement systems

The Arkados Vid-Quick™ solutions, which utilize high performance Blackfin® processors from Analog Devices for their software programmable video codec processing capabilities, include the following reference designs for whole-house distribution of video:

* Arkados Vid-Quick IPTV Video Receiver is designed to serve as a low-cost IPTV set-top box, capable of receiving video streams using a broad range of compression codecs such as H.264, WMA, MPEG-4, etc.
* Arkados Vid-Quick Surveillance Video Receiver receives video data from a variety of HomePlug-certified video cameras and displays the output on an ordinary television
* Arkados Vid-Quick Digital Picture Frame is capable of displaying still images obtained through the HomePlug network from a variety of sources on a regular TV

“The Arkados chip works in concert with our Blackfin processors to enable a wide variety of video applications,” said Jerry McGuire, General Manager, Convergent Platforms and Services Group, Analog Devices. “At CES, we are already demonstrating whole-house streaming video. But by using a variety of codecs that the Blackfin processors support, ADI and Arkados have created a technological platform that can be molded and shaped to enable a diverse collection of audio and video delivery systems.”

“Arkados is focused on accelerating the time between product concept and getting product on the shelves,” said Stephen Woodman, Vice President of Sales and Business Development for Arkados. “We help our customers by providing them with turnkey hardware and software platforms that are also very flexible. This allows them to create entire product lines – with a variety of products containing features ranging from basic to advanced – using essentially the same underlying components.

Additional reference design details will be made available on the Arkados website in the coming weeks; please visit www.arkados.com for regular updates.

About Arkados Group, Inc.

Arkados, “the HomePlug Applications Company,” delivers a universal platform that enables the effortless networking of home entertainment and computer devices using standard electricity lines. The company’s system-on-chip solutions are uniquely designed to drive a wide variety of powerline-enabled consumer electronics and home computing products, such as stereos, radios, speakers, MP3 players, computers, televisions, gaming consoles, security cameras and cable and DSL modems. Arkados customers can bring numerous sophisticated, full-featured products to market faster at a lower overall development cost using a single platform: the company’s versatile and programmable ArkTIC™ platform. Arkados solutions leverage the benefits of HomePlug Powerline Alliance specifications, and can also be used for in-building and to-the-home (BPL) applications. Arkados™, ArkTIC™, Vid-Quick™ and Direct to Speaker™ are trademarks of Arkados Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of the Arkados Group, Inc. Other names and brands may be claimed as the property of others. More information can be found at www.arkados.com.