Israeli and UK based conditional access market leader NDS has landed one of the bigger and more serious European DVB-H service launches as a customer, in the form of Sistema Mass Media of Russia.
Sistema said it has chosen a suite of NDS technologies to secure and manage both its IPTV and mobile TV platforms, using a Unified Headend to manage and secure delivery to set-top boxes, PCs and a variety of mobile handsets which will each have a version of VideoGuard conditional access. The system is expected to be available to all Russian mobile subscribers regardless of their network and run across 17 major cities by the end of this year.
The NDS Unified Headend is not an actual head end in the sense of being an encoder, but is a common license server for conditional access and Digital Rights Management (DRM). The system will secure broadcast and VoD services to a variety of devices ‘ set-top boxes (STBs), mobile phones, PCs, Portable Media Players (PMPs) and digital video recorders (DVRs).
The new DVB-H mobile TV service will be delivered from Digital Teleradiobroacsting, an SMM subsidiary, which will debut in Moscow, plus 16 other Russian cities with populations of over one million. Unlike most other DVB-H deployments which are tied to a specific mobile operator and require a subscription and operator-specific SIM, SMM’s upcoming DVB-H service will be available to all Russian mobile subscribers regardless of their network service provider. Of course they will need to purchase a DVB-H enabled handset.
VideoGuard Mobile is claimed to support both the Open Security Framework (OSF) and OMA BCAST smartcard profile standards and offers seamless migration between both and is integrated with a variety of handsets including new models to be supplied by Samsung, LG and Gigabyte of Korea.
‘Only NDS was able to provide us with a complete and cost-effective solution that enables us to offer truly converged services to our customers. NDS not only provides the flexibility to combine multiple platforms for a single management view of operations but it also gives us the opportunity to offer new advanced services in the future,’ said Dr. Vitaly Shub, Deputy CEO SMM.
Rethink’s projection of DVB-H subscribers in Russia is expected to grow to about 5 million devices by the end of 2012, based primarily on this installation, although there are others, and entirely on DVB-H technology.
This is the first major NDS contract to protect DVB-H content, with most of the previous deals going to Nagravision and Irdeto.