Mobile companies fight for flexible mobile TV standards in Europe
By Dusan Belic on Sunday, May 27th, 2007 at 12:28 AM PST In Mobile TV
It’s not a secret that European Commission wants to push DVB-H as a mobile TV standard throughout the European Union. That kind of decision would certainly benefit Nokia (NYSE: NOK) and other wireless companies, who already invested heavily in this standard. However, one wonders is this the right way to go? For instance, Korean handset manufacturers are already shipping T-DMB handsets to consumers, and as far as we can tell, that technology works.
Now, mobile industry leaders organized by mobile TV industry lobby group FLO Forum at a conference in Brussels argued that, because mobile TV is such a cutting-edge service, only time and a flexible market can tell which type of technology will prove the best.
Jens Arnbak, chair of tele-information techniques in the electrical engineering department of Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands said: “Why would you wish at this early stage to insist on any particular standard when we do know that many other possibilities are available?”
On the other hand, European Telecoms Commissioner Viviane Reding commented that without a single standard, it will be impossible for companies to invest with confidence in new innovative technologies. (via: marketwatch)
Whatever technology wins-out to become the standard for broadcast TV on mobiles, the net effect as far as the viewer is concerned will be the same: full-length broadcast TV on mobile phones.
Given the cost of deploying broadcast TV services and the fact that people only watch mobile TV for a few minutes at a time – we at ROK believe full-length broadcast TV on mobiles to have a finite value.
On-demand unicast streaming of live and looped channels over existing 2.5G ang 3G networks, however, has a much higher value in the eyes of the viewer.