HDMI Licensing company has announced that starting from November 1, 2006, the annual licensing fee for the interface will be lowered to $10 thousand per year. The agent believes that fee reduction will help various companies to adopt the new standard and to increase HDMI market share.

“The reduction of the annual fee, which was already minimal, will make it easier for smaller manufacturers to license the HDMI specification and will help ensure that all companies, large or small, can implement cutting edge HDMI technology into their products,” said Leslie Chard, president of HDMI Licensing, LLC.

Starting from November, annual administration fee for HDMI adopters will be $10 000, not $15 000, as today. The fee reduction was made possible by HDMI’s growing success in the marketplace: more than 400 makers of consumer electronics and PC products worldwide have adopted HDMI, HDMI Licensing said.

High definition multimedia interface (HDMI) is an interface in consumer electronics that can carry both uncompressed high-definition (HD) video (up to 1920x1080 progressive scan, 24-bit) and uncompressed 8-channel audio in all HD formats. While initially HDMI was only available on consumer electronics, recently a number of graphics cards makers, including GeCube, PowerColor, Sapphire Technology and some others, introduced add-in graphics boards for personal computers, which have HDMI connector.

Additionally, the China Video Industry Association (CVIA), a leading consumer electronics association in China, has announced that it would promote and support the use of HDMI by the consumer electronics industry in China.