Someone You Should Know: Sung-Ik Park, ETRI

Posted on July 24, 2017 in ATSC News

Project leader, father and explorer

Sung-Ik Park, principal researcher at the Electronics and Telecommunications Institute, is the project leader in the terrestrial digital TV department of ETRI in South Korea. Building on his 15 years of ATSC 1.0 transmitter/receiver implementation field verification work, he has been heavily involved in various aspects of ATSC 3.0 development.

“ATSC 3.0 is totally different from ATSC 1.0,” he says. “While ATSC 1.0 normally provides linear service for fixed reception, ATSC 3.0 is designed to provide linear and non-linear services to both fixed and mobile though broadcast and broadband simultaneously. This feature not only makes ATSC 3.0 be a platform to get information/news, but also enables terrestrial broadcast to cooperate with the existing 4G and upcoming 5G, so that new monetization will be provided to broadcasters.”

More Streams, More Capacity

Park says he sees Layered Division Multiplexing (LDM) as “the most impressive feature of ATSC 3.0” because it provides a 3 to 9 dB gain compared to the traditional TDM/FDM, meaning a broadcaster using the LDB technology will have more streams (or more capacity) with the same or larger coverage with the same capacity.

He is most active in ATSC 3.0’s S32 physical-layer specialist group, where has been contributing to the development of the most advanced terrestrial transmission technology. He’s also participated in plug-fests with his colleagues to implement the first ATSC 3.0 transmitter and receiver prototypes which support all physical layer baseline technologies, including LDM.

Major Efforts in Korea

Park’s main research interests include error correction codes and digital communications, particularly regarding signal processing for digital television.  

He is currently working on two main projects – Korea’s nationwide single-frequency network implementation and development of ATSC 3.0 modulator/demodulator technologies.

Outdoorsman, Family Man

Park is a husband and father of two children—a seven-year-old daughter and a five-year-old son. His daughter is learning piano and swimming, and his son is learning Taekwondo. He says his wife, who is a school teacher, is the “world’s best mother.”

Park enjoys hiking and cycling both with his family and his colleagues including dedicating a full week of each summer to these activities. This year, he is planning to visit the largest national park in South Korea, Mount Jiri.

Posted in ATSC News