Pace Micro to Expand

Boca Raton, Fla.-U.K.-based digital set-top maker Pace Micro Technology plc said last week that it plans to expand its engineering team to meet the challenge of new and repeat business wins and to further the development of new technologies for the networked home.

The vendor's plans include adding 40 hardware and software engineers in the U.S. during the next 12 months. They will be based at Pace's local headquarters here.

Pace already claims one of the world's largest engineering teams dedicated to the development of digital set-top-box technology. The team has grown by 70 percent over the past year, and already comprises almost 40 percent of Pace's overall work force.

The company is now looking to recruit at least another 150 software and hardware engineers based across all of its engineering sites worldwide.

Pace is aggressively pursuing the U.S. market for cable, satellite and digital-subscriber-line set-top-box development. It has pocketed a minimum order of 750,000 boxes from Time Warner Cable and an order of 350,000 set-tops from Comcast Corp., the second- and third-largest domestic MSOs.

Pace calls itself the world's largest dedicated developer of digital set-top-box technology. The company has about 1,000 employees. Its headquarters is in Shipley, West Yorkshire.