14 DAY TRIAL // NTT DOCOMO, INC. announced today the development of a new audio technology for mobile phones, a highly efficient mobile spatial audio transmission technology to be more precise, which is meant to allow users who are listening to multiple sound sources at the same time to “assign a spatial position to each sound source,” a feature that could prove rather useful when playing a game or attending a conference call.
According to the company, the new technology can offer those who use headphones the possibility to hear the voice of each speaker as coming from a certain unique direction in space, in a move attempting to create some sort of a virtual face-to-face communication environment. DOCOMO also announced that it planned to further work on the development of the technology so as to make it available for commercialization, while also stating that the technology could prove very useful in applications like mobile conference calls and tele-education, as well as online games.
Unlike the existing spatial audio transmission technologies, which process audio encoding/decoding and spatial audio synthesis independently, the new one announced by DOCOMO comes with a much more efficient method, as it integrates the two processes, a move that is meant to minimize bandwidth for mobile phones and other devices.
According to the company, the processes are performed both on the server and on the client, while also being designed to collaborate. Each of the speakers' voice is analyzed on the server, which identifies important sound components, compresses them into a single Steam and then sends them onto the mobile device. On the other hand, the handsets need to decode the stream, while also synthesizing spatial audio images at the same time.
DOCOMO stated that it intended to demonstrate the new spatial audio transmission technology on the docomo PRO series HT-01A handsets at the Wireless Technology Park 2009, on May 12 and 13, at Pacifico Yokohama.