Silicon Image today announced that it signed a cross-licensing agreement with Sunplus Technology Co., Ltd..

Under the agreement, Silicon Image will obtain a comprehensive license of certain intellectual property from Taiwan-based Sunplus. Silicon Image will pay Sunplus $40 million upon delivery and completion of certain milestones. This agreement enables Silicon Image to enhance its development of DTV technology and other consumer product offerings. The new agreement augments and continues to build upon a long-standing relationship between Silicon Image and Sunplus under which the two companies have been working on a joint project to co-develop a line of integrated video processors for the fast-growing DTV market.

The Sunplus transaction complements the acquisition of sci-worx GmbH ("sci-worx") announced on Jan. 4, 2007. The approximately 140 engineers that joined Silicon Image in this acquisition will play a central role in DTV technology development for Silicon Image, building upon intellectual property originating from Silicon Image, sci-worx and Sunplus.

"This transaction, together with the sci-worx acquisition, represents an important step forward in our video integration and connectivity strategy," said Steve Tirado, president and CEO of Silicon Image. "The IP from Sunplus provides several hundred man-years of proven intellectual property development in the digital television and DVD marketplace. With a larger and stronger engineering workforce drawing on the combined IP of three leaders in digital media technology, we expect to be well positioned for long-term growth through more innovative and integrated products for the consumer electronics market."