InterDigital acquires Hillcrest Labs

InterDigital has acquired Hillcrest Labs, a pioneer in sensor processing technology.

Founded in 2001, Hillcrest Labs has innovated in the area of Smart TV, and their Freespace sensor processing technology has broadened to encompass virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) systems, gaming systems, wearable devices, smartphones, robotics and other categories.

Hillcrest Labs’ customers have included electronics giants like LG, Lenovo, ZTE, Coolpad, LeEco, Sony and others. The company has also developed an intellectual property portfolio of more than 235 granted patents and pending applications. The Hillcrest Labs team of approximately 40 employees will remain based in Rockville, MD as part of the InterDigital team.

Commenting on the acquisition, William J. Merritt, President and CEO of InterDigital, said: “Hillcrest Labs is driving some of the foundational innovation in sensors and sensor fusion, a technology that is already important today, and poised to become pervasive in a broad range of consumer electronic products including smartphones, AR and VR systems, wearables, and service robots, among others. Their customer base features some of the top electronics companies worldwide, and adding them to the InterDigital team broadens our offering for mobile devices and accelerates our technology footprint in markets that are adjacent to our existing position.”