The number of worldwide subscribers to IP television
services is set to rise to 68.9 million by 2009, generating
hardware sales worth £3.67bn, according to Infonetics
Research.
IPTV involves the delivery of digital television services over
an IP network. Although several marketing, content and technical
challenges have to be overcome to reach these figures, the number
of worldwide IPTV subscribers is expected to more than double every
year from 2005 to 2009, said Infonetics.
Infonetics analyst Jeff Heynen said, “IPTV is still in the 'kick
the tire' phase, with service providers doing trials rather than
mass deployments, but there is no question that IPTV is going
mainstream.”
The IPTV hardware revenue market was worth a modest £200m last
year, with a large chunk of the kit going to the Asia-Pacific
region, where much of the network infrastructure to support IPTV
already exists.
In Europe, Germany is well ahead of the UK when it comes to
delivering IPTV content to users. In the UK, technology partners
such as BT and Microsoft are still putting the final touches to
their IPTV projects.
Heynen said, “The technical hurdles are well known, such as
adequate broadband speeds being available to users, but the
regulatory issues are less predictable.”