LG U+ will develop a technology that generates and provides foreign language subtitles in real time on IPTV. The key is to implement it with device artificial intelligence (AI) technology that has been using semiconductors mounted on set-top boxes.

Song Dae-won, head of LG U+'s technology development group, said in a recent interview with Maeil Economy, "The number of multicultural families in Korea is increasing, and producing subtitles separately costs a lot," adding, "We are preparing a plan to provide it using AI."

Director Song leads the technology development organization at LG U+ and leads the development of AI technology applied to mobile and home services. It is involved in all related technologies, including IPTV and home CCTV, from the call secretary 'Excuse me'.

With the popularization of mobile AI technology, many users experience on-device AI on smartphones, LG U+ has also focused on AI functions of set-top boxes to improve the IPTV viewing experience.

Director Song explained, "We started to install AI semiconductors in the set-top box released in 2021, and about 45% of all set-top boxes currently distributed are products with semiconductors that can run on-device AI."

On-device AI literally refers to running AI on the device itself.

AI typically needs to undergo infrastructure processing, such as cloud, to perform operations, and on-device AI utilizes a lightweight model to perform operations on the device itself. It also has the advantage of reducing driving costs because it does not go through the cloud.

Director Song emphasized, "The key to on-device is to optimize and provide performance within the limits of terminals such as memory or NPU."

Until now, LG U+ has introduced a function that uses AI on the set-top box to distinguish between background sound and dialogue, to increase the volume of dialogue, to improve the contrast ratio of the screen, and to automatically adjust the location when subtitles overlap with the text on the screen.

Regarding the creation of foreign language subtitles, which are currently in the stage of technology development, he said, "There are costs to translate in real time using cloud infrastructure, and we are studying how to provide them on-device."