Dolby Laboratories, Inc. (often shortened to Dolby Labs and known simply as Dolby) is a British-American technology corporation specializing in audio noise reduction, audio encoding/compression, spatial audio, and HDR imaging. Dolby licenses its technologies to consumer electronics manufacturers.

History

Dolby Labs was founded by Ray Dolby (1933–2013) in London, England, in 1965. In the same year, he invented the Dolby Noise Reduction system, a form of audio signal processing for reducing the background hissing sound on cassette tape recordings. His first U.S. patent on the technology was filed in 1969, four years later. The method was first used by Decca Records in the UK. After this, other companies began purchasing Dolby’s A301 technology, which was the professional noise reduction system used in recording, motion picture, broadcasting stations and communications networks. These companies include BBC, Pye, IBC, CBS Studios, RCA, and Granada. He moved the company headquarters to the United States (San Francisco, California) in 1976. The first product Dolby Labs produced was the Dolby 301 unit which incorporated Type A Dolby Noise Reduction, a compander-based noise reduction system. These units were intended for use in professional recording studios. Dolby was persuaded by Henry Kloss of KLH to manufacture a consumer version of his noise reduction. Dolby worked more on companding systems and introduced Type B in 1968. Dolby also sought to improve film sound. As the corporation's history explains: The first film with Dolby sound was A Clockwork Orange (1971). The company was approached by Stanley Kubrick, who wanted to use Dolby’s noise reduction system to facilitate the film’s extensive mixing. The film went on to use Dolby noise reduction on all pre-mixes and masters, but a conventional optical soundtrack on release prints. Callan (1974) was the first film with a Dolby-encoded optical soundtrack. In 1975, Dolby released Dolby Stereo, which included a noise reduction system in addition to more audio channels (Dolby Stereo could actually contain additional center and surround channels matrixed from the left and right). The first film with a Dolby-encoded stereo optical soundtrack was Lisztomania (1975), although this only used an LCR (Left-Center-Right) encoding technique. The first true LCRS (Left-Center-Right-Surround) soundtrack was encoded on the movie A Star Is Born in 1976. In less than ten years, 6,000 cinemas worldwide were equipped to use Dolby Stereo sound. Dolby reworked the system slightly for home use and introduced Dolby Surround, which only extracted a surround channel, and the more impressive Dolby Pro Logic, which was the domestic equivalent of the theatrical Dolby Stereo. Dolby developed a digital surround sound compression scheme for the cinema. Dolby Stereo Digital (now simply called Dolby Digital) was first featured on the 1992 film Batman Returns. Introduced to the home theater market as Dolby AC-3 with the 1995 laserdisc release of Clear and Present Danger, the format did not become widespread in the consumer market, partly because of extra hardware that was necessary to make use of it, until it was adopted as part of the DVD specification. Dolby Digital is now found in the HDTV (ATSC) standard of the United States, DVD players, and many satellite-TV and cable-TV receivers. Dolby developed a digital surround sound compression scheme for the TV series The Simpsons. On February 17, 2005, the company became public, offering its shares on the New York Stock Exchange, under the symbol DLB. On March 15, 2005, Dolby celebrated its 40th anniversary at the ShoWest 2005 Festival in San Francisco. On January 8, 2007, Dolby announced the arrival of Dolby Volume at the International Consumer Electronics Show. On June 18, 2010, Dolby introduced Dolby Surround 7.1, and set up theaters worldwide with 7.1 surround speaker setups to deliver theatrical 7.1 surround sound. The first film to be released with this format was Pixar's Toy Story 3 which was later followed by fifty releases using the format. About 80% of films released are now mixed in Dolby Surround 7.1 by default. In April 2012, Dolby introduced its Dolby Atmos, a new cinematic technology adding overhead sound, first applied in Pixar's motion picture Brave. In July 2014, Dolby Laboratories announced plans to bring Atmos to home theater. The first television show to use the technology on disc was Game of Thrones. On February 24, 2014, Dolby acquired Doremi Labs for $92.5 million in cash plus an additional $20 million in contingent consideration that may be earned over a four-year period. In May 2015, Dolby reopened Vine Theatre as a 70-seat showcase theater, known as Dolby @ Vine or Dolby Screening Room Hollywood Vine. In May 2019, Dolby added Dolby Atmos to hundreds of newer songs in the music industry. In May 2020, Dolby launched a developer platform, Dolby.io, aimed at providing developers self-service access to Dolby technologies through public APIs. It allows any person, organization, small and big, to integrate in their websites, apps, games, etc. features such as media enhancements and transcoding, spatial audio, high-quality video communication and low-latency streaming.

Technologies

Analog audio noise reduction

Audio encoding/compression

Audio processing

Video processing

Digital cinema

Live sound

Over the years Dolby has introduced several surround sound systems. Their differences are explained below.

Dolby matrix surround systems

Dolby discrete surround systems

Controversy

ATSC

Dolby Digital AC-3 is used as the audio codec for the ATSC standards, though it was standardized as A/52 by the ATSC. It allows the transport of up to five channels of sound with a sixth channel for low-frequency effects (the so-called "5.1" configuration). In contrast, Japanese ISDB HDTV broadcasts use MPEG's Advanced Audio Coding (AAC) as the audio codec, which also allows 5.1 audio output. DVB allows both. MPEG-2 audio was a contender for the ATSC standard during the "Grand Alliance" shootout, but lost out to Dolby AC-3. The Grand Alliance issued a statement finding the MPEG-2 system to be "essentially equivalent" to Dolby, but only after the Dolby selection had been made. Later, a story emerged that MIT had entered into an agreement with Dolby whereupon the university would be awarded a large sum of money if the MPEG-2 system was rejected. Dolby also offered an incentive for Zenith to switch their vote (which they did); however, it is unknown whether they accepted the offer.