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Reliance’s move for Digicable must be a first step not a final move
Reliance Communications’ purchase of a majority stake in leading cable operator Digicable has again proved that the Anil Ambani led company is capable of pulling a headline-grabbing deal out of the bag, but what does the acquisition really mean for the company’s ambitions in the Indian broadband market?
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Telstra signs deal with NBN … so now what?
The announcement from Canberra came on a lazy Sunday afternoon when most of Australia’s movers and shakers were away from their desks – all except Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and Telstra Chairwoman Catherine Livingstone, who emerged from Parliament House to announce that they had finally struck a deal for Telstra to sell its fixed-line assets to the National Broadband Network Company (NBN Co.).
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Connected TVs loom large for pay TV operators, but barriers remain
The pay TV industry has been dreading the arrival of the connected TV, when the TV finally reached out and connected to the Internet, giving viewers access to millions of hours of online-video content – a terrifying thought if you are trying to sell a pay TV service. And facilitating that access are “over the top” Internet players, such as Apple, Google and the major US studios, whose potential market power the pay TV players have long feared. Read the rest of this entry »
But the truth is that the OTT players have a huge task ahead of them – especially in Asia Pacific.
Video-based services look the best bet to drive FTTH take-up, says Tony Brown
Asia Pacific’s FTTH bigwigs met recently to discuss the state of their industry, and the consensus was that, as expected, FTTH will rise or fall on the back of video. Read the rest of this entry »
At the 2010 Asia Pacific FTTH Council conference – held May 25-26 in Seoul, perhaps the most heavily fibered city in the world – fixed-line executives from countries as far apart on the FTTH-usage spectrum as Japan and India gathered to discuss the future of FTTH in the region. The discussion focused not only on the progress made by the operators whose executives addressed delegates but also on what the key drivers of FTTH services are likely to be in Asia Pacific in terms of new services.
Telstra’s role still clouding Australian NBN rollout
Australian communications minister Stephen Conroy triumphantly announced the findings of the A$25 million implementation study today into the National Broadband Network carried out by KPMG and McKinsey and Company. Read the rest of this entry »
The study gave the NBN project a big green tick on all fronts but there were a couple of crucial points raised at Conroy’s announcement that deserve further scrutiny.
Increased capping of wireless broadband plans poses so many questions
As more 3G and WiMAX wireless broadband services are deployed across Asia Pacific a clear trend is emerging of operators ditching all-you-can-eat plans in order to protect the performance levels of their networks, but how will this trend affect the shape of the broadband market?
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It was all going so well until the mobile guy turned up, says Tony Brown
The WiMAX Forum Congress Asia 2010 in Taipei was going swimmingly with lots of good news stories for the WiMAX community to get excited about and then Jan Nilsson, president of local 3G and WiMAX operator Far EasTone, took to the stage and brought everybody back to earth with a bump.
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OTT still a burning issue for ops at the IPTV World Forum, says Tony Brown
For the Asia Pacific IPTV operators attending the IPTV World Forum 2010 in London last month, exploring Over-The-Top (OTT) content remains high on their agenda but they are still cautious about working with OTT providers on a commercial basis.
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China’s online-video players face tough task in going ‘straight’
The decision by China’s leading online-video players, such as Tudou.com and Youku.com, to move toward a more orthodox business model by signing licensing deals with content providers and even beginning to produce some of their own content seems like good news for everyone. But there is a long way to go before any of the country’s online players can really claim to have “gone straight.”
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Can OTT players really beat pay TV operators at their own game?
With the “over the top”-content game attracting IT giants, such as Apple and You Tube, huge regional players, like Tudou and Yukou in China, and many other global media brands, it’s not hard to imagine that the world’s pay-TV operators could get pushed aside in the battle for consumers’ wallets.
That is, until you take a step back from the hype and talk to hardened pay-TV executives, who say OTT players are in for a mighty shock if they think that getting subscribers to part with their hard-earned dollars in return for access to video content is anything but hard work.
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Analyst
Tony Brown
Senior Analyst for broadband, most particularly in the Asia Pacific region.
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