Monday, 29 September 2008

IPTV Services Will Reach 19.6 Million, Says Gartner

According to a new research conducted by Gartner, an information technology research and advisory firm, worldwide subscriptions to IPTV services are on track to reach 19.6 million by the end of this year, up 64.1 percent from 12 million in 2007.

Revenue from worldwide Internet protocol television is forecast to reach USD 4.5 billion, up 93.5 percent from a year earlier, with Western Europe boasting the largest number of IPTV subscribers and North America the largest market for IPTV revenue. It forecast that 1.1 percent of households worldwide would be using IPTV in 2008, and expects that to rise to 2.8 percent by 2012.

New competitors in Internet video include portal players such as YouTube and Joost, and social network sites such as MySpace and Facebook, Gartner said. In addition, device manufacturers are offering their own Internet-based offerings, such as NeuLion and AppleTV, while some broadcasters, such as the BBC, NBC, and Fox, are taking their programming directly to consumers.

"The biggest change since 2007 is the rapid advent of new entrants making inroads in consumer video consumption and placing greater demands on IPTV operators to innovate," said Gartner research director Elroy Jopling, in a statement. "The video consumption field will become increasingly crowded."

Gartner also defines IPTV services as the use of a carrier-based managed IP broadband network to deliver television and video content services to the end-user's TV set using a set-top box, and delivering picture quality at least equivalent to existing pay-TV or free-to-air services.