Variety Magazine reported this week on the continuing problems of licensing IPTV in Korea, with the two regulators, the Ministry of Information and Communication and the Korean Broadcasting Commission finally putting the question of which of them should regulate IPTV to the National Assembly.
Both Korea Telecom and Hanaro have been forced to innovate through web based VoD services instead, while waiting for approval for genuine IPTV which may never come, with MegaTV and HanaTV being launched.
Hanaro reported its figures this week, doubling TV revenues to just $8.3 million for the half year with a customer base of 540,000 subscribes for the $10 a month service. Hanaro now has 1.23 million subscribers to its 100 Mbps broadband service, which reaches 9.8 million homes and HanaTV has proved so popular, says Variety, that there is now constant speculation that it will be acquired from its VC dominated shareholders.
KT’s MegaTV has only just been launched, working along the same lines and has already acquired 50,000 subscribers at a slightly lower price and it says it will have 300,000 subscribers by the end of the year.
Because of the speeds of their lines, both HanaTV and MegaTV are able to offer High Definition content over the internet. LG and SK Telecom are both expected to launch similar services shortly, missing out perhaps on the huge investment that genuine IPTV requires.