A Better Option -- compression technique

This man just came up with A Better Option



CHENNAI, AUGUST 21: Heard of the engineering graduate from Anna University in Chennai who came up with a revolutionary image compression technology that made big daddies MPEG, JPEG, GIF and TIFF look crude? He could soon be clambering onto your desktop.

In 2003, Arvind Thiagarajan invented ABO (Adoptive Binary Optimisation) to reduce the sizes of images and documents more effectively than anything that existed then.

Thiagarajan was working with the Singapore-based K K Women and Children Hospital when the head of cardiology at Asia’s biggest paediatric institute asked if he could help them transmit huge scanned images.



Little did the just-graduated engineer, with no specialised knowledge in imaging sciences, realise that he was about to create an IT revolution.

Thiagarajan was asked if it was possible to convert all the video images of echo-cardiograms, stored on VHS tapes, into digital formats.

To do it the traditional way would have cost the hospital a staggering $2.33 million and more than eight years. Plus, digitizing a 10-minute echo scan would require 16 GB storage space.

‘‘That was my starting point with compression algorithm and the beginning of MatrixView (a company which he subsequently floated),’’ Thiagarajan told The Indian Express, during a brief stopover in Chennai earlier this month.

He devised a method whereby each pixel was seen as a value stored in a matrix and, by arranging and rearranging them, he was able to achieve a compression of 30 times without a single pixel loss in the process.

‘‘In all other formats, there is a certain level of loss while compressing the image or data,’’ said Thiagarajan. The JPEG had managed a compression of a mere four to five times. ABO performed better on key parameters including, most importantly, image quality.



Impressed by Arvind’s achievement, an American doctor came up with a new expansion for ABO—‘A Better Option.’

Arvind wasted little time in getting an independent validation of his invention by auditing company, Ernst & Young, in Sydney.

Two years later, Arvind patented the algorithm behind the ABO. The IPO of his Singapore-based company MatrixView, promoted with investments from an NRI in Singapore and a Korean angel investor, was oversubscribed on the Australian Stock Exchange within the first hour.

‘‘Within five minutes of listing the company, the share price went up to one (Australian) dollar (about Rs 32). It tripled within a week. Today the share has stabilised at Rs 50 and currently our company’s market capitalisation is Rs 500 crore,’’ Thiagarajan said.

His sights are now on the US market. ‘‘Next year we are planning a major launch there.’’ For this, MatrixView is in the process of identifying partners for business development and corporate investments.

Soon, there will be a launch in the Indian market as well. ‘‘The scope is immense. In the medical field, the ABO will enable transfer of full, multi-size CT scan of 16 or more images, even on a dial-up internet line,’’ he said.

MatrixView’s financial solutions are already being implemented in the Hong Kong-based HSBC Ltd and an insurance company in Singapore.

‘‘Finally we want ABO to be available as a desktop utility catering to both image and data for all PCs,’’ said Thiagarajan. But, before that, the ‘Inventor and Chief Scientist’ of MatrixView will ‘‘perfect’’ his algorithm further and delve deeper into the exciting world of medical, financial and mobile solutions.

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Small is beautiful, ask
Arvind Thiagarajan

• Thiagarajan, working with a Singapore hospital, was asked if he could convert ECG video images into digital formats
• To do it the traditional way would have cost the hospital a $2.33 mn and more than eight years
• In 2003, he invented ABO to reduce sizes of images, documents; nothing that good existed until then
• Two yrs later, Arvind patented the algorithm behind the ABO. The IPO of his Singapore-based company MatrixView was oversubscribed on the Australian Stock Exchange within the first hour