This part of ISO/IEC 23003 specifies the reference model of the Spatial Audio Object Coding (SAOC)
technology that is capable of recreating, modifying and rendering a number of audio objects based on a
smaller number of transmitted channels and additional parametric data. In the preferred modes of operating
the SAOC system, the transmitted signal can be either mono or stereo. The audio objects can be represented
by a mono and stereo signal or have the MPEG Surround (MPS) Multi-channel Background Object (MBO)
format. The additional parametric data exhibits a significantly lower data rate than required for transmitting all
objects individually, making the coding very efficient. At the same time this ensures compatibility of the
transmitted signal with legacy devices.
When a multi-channel rendering setup (e.g. a 5.1 loudspeaker setup) is required, the SAOC system acts as a
transcoder, converting the additional parametric data to MPS parameters, and interfaces to the MPS decoder
that acts as rendering device. For certain rendering setups (e.g. a binaural or plain stereo setup), the SAOC
system behaves as a decoder, using its own rendering engine. Another key feature is that the SAOC
parametric data from different streams can be merged at parameter level to allow for the combination of
SAOC streams, similar to the functionality of a Multi-point Control Unit (MCU).