The Hyderabad based Ichip India has unveiled a technology that will provide Internet-based entertainment, education and communication services through a single integrated device.

The new device named, @Box is viewed as an affordable replacement for home entertainment PC. The company is planning to commence the commercial production of the new low-cost device by March next year. It is also planning to deploy the device in a million households in one year. The device is expected to be priced at around $ 100 per device.

The company is also having talks with an original equipment manufacturer in India for integrating TVs with in-built @Box. It’s planning to bring out the new TVs by the middle of next year. It’s looking to get into partnership deals with telecom and broadband service providers including BSNL, MTNL and Bharti for offering the services, such as IPTV (Internet protocol television) and VoIP (voice over Internet protocol).

K A Padmanabham, CDM Ichip India, said, “At about $100 per piece, every Indian household would be able to access Internet at home. The hardware, operating system and the software are developed by our company. It is an easy to use unlike a personal computer.”

According to the sources, the company has filed four patents for the technology and has invested about Rs 10 crore for developing the technology.

Kota Bhaskar, CTO & president of Ichip India, “We are in talks with manufacturers in South Korea, Thailand and China for manufacturing the device. We are also looking at the possibility of manufacturing it in India at a low-cost basis.’’

Not requiring fancy band-width connection for operating, the new device is also suitable for Indian environment as it can operate on tractor battery and without an air conditioner. Presently, users have different devices like TV, phone and computer for accessing different services. However, the new device will let the users to integrate these devices and access web services on TV or entertainment services on computer.

With its hardware, such as remote keyboard, mouse and joystick interfaces, the new device will also let the users to access 3D game, videoconferencing, IPTV, and VoIp services. It’ll also offer digital video recorder (DVR) or personal video recorder (PVR) services, in addition to, Conditional Access (CA) and Digital Rights Management (DRM) support.

Bhaskar said, “The device offers standard definition support to a low cost TV and providers interfaces to a TV, monitor and HDMI enabled flat panel TV.’’

Ichip India is looking at profit sharing arrangement or equity partnership with OEMs, to generate revenues. It may also follow a service-based pricing system or revenue sharing arrangement with telecom services providers.