CHICAGO – With IPTV on course to become a credible Pay TV platform in North America, even though nobody expects AT&T or Verizon to crush the cable or satellite industry with their broadcast TV and VOD offers, IPTV is achieving good penetration in markets where it has deployed, says the organizers of the IPTV North America conference, to be held in Chicago July 22 and 23.
(Cartt.ca, as a media partner, will be providing coverage from the Windy City next week.)
In January, Verizon was claiming 21% video penetration for Keller, Texas, just four months after the service was launched (Verizon’s debut for FiOS TV).
In Canada, Manitoba Telecom Services has hit 20% penetration (50,000-plus subscribers) in Winnipeg, where services have been available since 2002. Further west, SaskTel reports average penetration of 20% in the cities it serves. Telus and Aliant are also building their networks and making strides.
Thanks primarily to AT&T and Verizon, North America is expected to account for a large proportion of the world’s new IPTV subscriptions during the next few years. They join the significant number of regional and local telecom operators in North America who pioneered this new digital TV platform but the big question is whether any company bringing pay TV to market this late – even those with the resources of AT&T – can gain significant market share on a national basis, says the conference organizers.
North American IPTV service providers face a tougher test than their European counterparts, who have benefited from a natural watershed in the Pay TV marketplace thanks to the introduction of DVR (Digital Video Recorder), true VOD and Replay TV (mainly 2005 onwards) and HDTV (late 2005 onwards). In the U.S., VOD is an established cable offering and HDTV is available widely on cable and satellite. Cable operators have also pursued an increasingly aggressive triple-play strategy and this makes it even harder to tempt customers from their legacy suppliers.
So where are North American IPTV providers going to find their subscribers and what services must they provide (and evolve) in order to differentiate themselves in the crowded Pay TV marketplace?
These are some of the themes that will be addressed next week at the IPTV World Forum North America conference and exhibition, which will draw together leading IPTV service providers, content providers, analysts and key technology vendors for what we believe will become one of the key events in the North American IPTV calendar.
So for some new perspective on what’s going on in the telco TV space, turn to Cartt.ca’s coverage from IPTV World North America next week.
