Broadband Forum chief calls IPTV “on the brink”

The chairman of the Broadband Services Forum planned to tell the National Association of Broadcasters today that IPTV is “on the brink of a breakthrough,” according to a pre-released copy of his remarks.

Helmut Leopold, head of platform and technology management at Telekom Austria, was to cite the current volume of IPTV subscribers at about 3 million, led by PCCW in Hong Kong with 758,000 subscribers and then by the European market. In that area, three competitors in France--freebox TV, MaLigne tv and n9uf TV--together have 900,000 subscribers, while there are 326,000 users of Telefonica’s imagenio service in Spain and 167,000 Italian subscribers to Fastweb.

Leopold said the BSF will continue to encourage greater cooperation among service providers, media companies, producers in the telecommunications industry, and content aggregators because its members are “convinced that only through intensive cooperation and widespread dialogue among the entire broadband community can the business success of the industry be assured.” He planned to say that the BSF is cooperating with other industry forums such as the TeleManagement Forum and the MPEG Industry Forum.

Other highlights of the planned presentation:

• Europe is expected to remain the IPTV leader for 2007, although deployments in China, India and Australia could push the Asia-Pacific region forward.
• The “Walled Garden” business model is working because it “protects the value of the content, secures the highest picture quality up to HDTV and thereby allows the realization of different business models.” Internet TV is unable to protect intellectual property or assure quality, does not provide a continuous billing relationship for the content provider.
• IPTV will help monetize long-tail content, as service providers “sell less of more,” using IPTV to offer a wider range of content.
• As digital video recorders proliferate, consumers are “actively and consciously watching television on the basis of personally compiled program offerings.”
• Younger consumers are becoming “active media producers” through sites such as YouTube, current.tv or Buntes Fernsehen in Austria and progressive television providers should offer “talented, semi-professional ‘prosumers’ appropriate space on TV.