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Archive for the 'Mobile TV' Category

French government snubs CSA and confirms allocation of 790-862MHz band to mobile broadband

January 13, 2009 by Barry Flynn

It looks as though the French government has ignored the pleas of its TV regulator, the CSA, to take its hands off the 790-862MHz frequency band, the lower portion of which the watchdog wanted to reserve for digital TV post analogue switchoff.

Yesterday, prime minister François Fillon held a ministerial summit at which an updated version of France’s digital plan (France numérique 2012) was announced. The press release put out afterwards (NB, a PDF) reveals that Fillon signed a document just before Christmas mandating the allocation of the 790-862MHz sub-band to mobile broadband. As the CSA feared, this chops a sizeable chunk - 40MHz - off the UHF spectrum that was previously to have been reserved for TV-based services, which runs from 470-830MHz.

It’s possible that the CSA (and any other opponents) could have one more bite at the cherry. Fillon has asked ARCEP (the telecoms regulator) to put out to public consultation by the end of February “the conditions and the modalities of a joint request for proposals for the 780-862 MHz and 2.6GHz bands”, with the objective of attributing the frequencies by the end of this year (2.6GHz is another frequency destined for mobile broadband use).

Opponents of the measure probably wouldn’t be able to reverse that decision, but they could in their consultation responses request that bidders for the 780-862MHz slot be forced to take appropriate measures to protect TV services in adjacent UHF frequencies from interference, something UK regulator Ofcom has proposed in its own consultations about the Digital Dividend. This could be expensive to carry out in practice and could act as a possible ‘spoiler’ for new entrants.

Other measures announced yesterday by Fillon include the creation of a new government working-party on mobile TV, tasked to establish in concert with stakeholders, between now and the end of March, “a viable economic model for mobile TV, with a view to a rapid rollout of the corresponding infrastructures.”

The announcement represents a tacit admission by the government that the French DVB-H project has so far been a failure. ConnectedTV thought the original plans were a recipe for disaster because of their failure to require mobile TV players to meet any targets for comprehensive coverage or indoor reception. The government, however, seems to think that it’s the business model which is at fault - something ConnectedTV has also been banging on about for some time. Either way, it ain’t working.

Posted in Broadband and Mobile TV. 0 Comments

Nielsen: mobile video usage highest in the USA, but still only 5% of subs

January 8, 2009 by Barry Flynn

Back to that perennial source of interest, mobile video.

Nielsen has just published a consumer insight piece about its growth prospects, itself extracted from a new white paper by its telecoms practice (here, note large PDF file).

The overall message is, as we have reported before, that consumer take-up of mobile video remains low, even where lots of handsets have access to it (note that Nielsen is not talking here about mobile broadcast TV, but the one-to-one 3G variety).Nielsen found that in 2008, the overall use of mobile video in the US stood at just 5% of all subscribers - low compared to other mobile media such as Internet access, ringtones and games. In fact, this is high by international standards, Nielsen reckons, with the UK on only 3%, for instance (see table below).

Figure 1: International Mobile Video Penetration (Q3 2008)

Market Mobile Video Use Amongst Mobile Subscribers
USA 5%
France 4%
Italy 4%
Germany 3%
Spain 3%
Sweden* 3%
UK 3%
China 2%
India 1%
Russia 1%
Brazil 0.2%

Source: The Nielsen CompanyNB Sweden estimate is Q1 2008, US figure is for subs aged 13+, all other markets 15+

Other notable findings:

  • 42% of mobile users in the US access video via a subscription
  • The top occasion for mobile video use is ‘while waiting for someone or something’ (59% of mobile video users); followed by ‘while travelling away from home’ (51%); and ‘while at home’ (37%) - a result which has been widely replicated in studies of mobile broadcast TV usage
  • Comedy is most popular form of mobile video content today
  • In Q3 2008, 54% of mobile video viewers reported average session lengths of 15 minutes-plus
  • The typical mobile video viewers tunes into their phone for an average of 3hrs 37mins per month

Note that the last figure equates to just 13 minutes or so per day - given the small user base, not really the basis for a mass-market advertising proposition, as yet, particularly given its fragmentation across different mobile video platforms.Nielsen, while realistic about mobile video’s prospects, believes (like Videonuze) that mobile video could take off in 2009, but only on three conditions:

  1. The expanded use of mobile Web and mobile Web video (e.g. You Tube)
  2. The rollout of mobile broadcast TV
  3. An improved advertising subsidization of subscription-based streaming mobile video services

While agreeing on the first point, Connected TV does not see many indications at present that conditions 2) and 3) are likely to be satisfied to the extent that they will lead to a turnaround any time soon. Mobile broadcast TV seems to be moribund, at least in Europe (but see here re analogue variants), and we have a chicken-and-egg situation with the advertisers. They won’t take it seriously as a medium until it becomes much bigger, but it seems it can’t become much bigger without advertising.

Posted in Mobile TV and Research. 0 Comments

French government one of few to have accepted ITU recommendation to allocate DTT spectrum to mobile broadband

January 2, 2009 by Barry Flynn

This piece from the International Herald Tribune puts the French debate over mobile broadband’s potential cannibalisation of DTT frequencies in context.

It seems the French government is one of the few European administrations (the others being the Finnish, Swedish and Swiss authorities) to have agreed to an ITU recommendation in 2007 that its members should set aside some of their UHF frequencies for mobile broadband - this despite subsequent plans to allocate these to DTT.

The IHT article quotes a Nokia Siemens executive who points out that a wireless broadband network transmitting over UHF frequencies rather than the current 2.1GHz band used in Europe would require 75% fewer base stations to cover the same area.

The article also notes that while the European Commission is in favour of a harmonised mobile broadband frequency, the spectrum experts’ group that advises it, the Radio Spectrum Policy Group, is split. Moreover, the EU’s council of ministers has rejected a plan by Viviane Reding, the EU’s telecoms commissioner, to give the EC a role in co-ordinating spectrum at a pan-European level. (Reding is on record as advocating a co-ordinated frequency band for European mobile TV services).

This one will run and run….

Posted in Digital Terrestrial and Mobile TV. 0 Comments