UK researcher Futuresource says that Blu-ray discs will sell 100 million during 2009, fuelled by cuts in prices and an increasing number of LCD HD TVs which can show Blu-ray content off to good effect. It says the US has moved from early adopter phase through to early majority, and that last year the US shipped 24 million disks which will rise to 80 million in 2009, ad then Europe will be gathering momentum, and has shipped 9 million devices last year, with the UK taking 40% of them.
Liberty Global is a good indicator of the direction of non-US pay TV and it reported revenues last week of $10.6 billion, up 17%. The company did make a loss, of $789 million compared to $197 million, but had a rise of 21% in operating income. The losses were down to a $145 million goodwill impairment at its Romanian operation, and foreign currency losses. The company operates cable TV and broadband businesses in the Netherlands, Switzerland, Austria, Ireland, Hungary, Belgium, Japan, Chile and parts of Eastern and Central Europe and said its Free Cash Flow was $763 million, up 82% and that it repurchased $2.2 billion of its own shares in 2008. Liberty Global lost 54,000 video RGUs (revenue generating units) but grew most other subscriber numbers and finished 2008 with 26.5 million RGUs with 15.6 million for video, 6.2 million for broadband and 4.7 million on telephony.
We sometimes forget that US encoder company Envivio, which tops the charts in encoding video for mobile phones, also has conventional encoders, and it has landed a deal with Aksh Optifibre, in India to put its Envivio 4Caster C4 encoder into its IPTV service, and a full ‘Three Screens’ strategy, with its 3G mobile streaming TV having an IPTV and Internet TV offering added alongside. Aksh Optifibre runs the MTNL network and will offer Doordarshan, Neo Sports, CNN and NDTV channels on its IPTV system.
Nokia has announced a series of schemes or lowering headcount without actual involuntary redundancy, including a Voluntary Resignation Package and the wider use of short-term unpaid leaves and sabbaticals. Nokia is also encouraging employees to take holiday as time off instead of taking cash compensation. This is all geared to lowering its costs during the recession. The voluntary resignation scheme will be made available worldwide, with a target of 1,000 employees applying by May 31.
Nagravision said this week that Italian broadcaster Mediaset has extended its contract on the Italian digital terrestrial pay TV business. The idea is that Mediaset Premium, which already uses Nagra to protect 2.7 million subscribers, will go from an anonymous smart card system that allows pre-pay to one that allows subscription pricing from between €10 to €24 a month. The idea is to convert as many people as possible during the analog switch off when it happens in Italy.
Nokia will add its Comes with Music concept in Australia on March 20,
built around the 5800 XpressMusic, Nokia’s first mass market touch screen device. The Comes with Music version of this handset, which means when you buy it you get free music for a year, was only launched last month first in the UK and is now being gradually rolled out and has now also opened in Singapore. In Australia the 5800 XpressMusic with 12 months subscription will be 979 Australian dollars and will also be available from, as yet, unnamed operators.
NDS, the UK and Israeli conditional access company said that Telecolumbus and PrimaCom which together form Germany’s third-largest cable operator serving 3.5 million cable-connected homes, will begin using its MediaHighway set top middleware. In 2008 they introduced the VideoGuard conditional access system, and will now add MediaHighway
Opera, the Norwegian browser company has released some remarkable statistics about the countries which are growing fastest in terms of internet usage using its Opera mini handset browser. Globally monthly page views jumped 18% to 7.6 billion web pages. Opera said that Armenia led all countries in Opera mini growth over the last year with usage jumping 2800%. Nigeria was second, with 1854% and other notable countries included Egypt (1391%), Philippines (570%) and Kazakhstan (419%). Even countries which began the year in the top 10, growth rates were still notable, particularly in developed countries such as the United States, the UK and Germany. Only China had less than 50% growth.
Active Matrix Organic Light Emitting Diodes (AMOLEDs), a long name for the most impressive screen technology since LCD, and likely one day to replace LCDs, are experienced 110% revenue growth in 2008 said DisplaySearch and it predicts that OLED display revenues will exceed $6 billion in 2015, up from $591 million in 2008. They accounted for less than 1% of total flat panel display revenue in 2008, but it will reach 5% by 2015, growing at 40% CAGR in revenues.
This week the Universal Powerline Association and the HomeGrid Forum which is pushing the G.hn standards efforts for multimedia over coax, power and phone lines, said they had signed a memorandum of understanding for the joint research, development, and commercialization of networking technologies and products ensuring coexistence, interoperability, and specification compliance. The two say they will cooperate to create a single MAC and PHY protocol for transporting multimedia across a home’s existing wiring to benefit consumers globally. In December 2008 the G.hn standard group reached consent on a single PHY protocol for next generation wireline technologies.
Orange has been ordered by a French Court to make available its Orange Sport TV channel for any French TV platform, reports Broadband TV News. France Telecom which owns Orange, is thought to be preparing an appeal, of this decision which went in favor of IPTV rivals Free and SFR. Orange now has a month to prepare a wholesale offer for rival TV operators, or face a €50,000 a day fine. Orange won rights to key soccer coverage in recent auctions and was refusing the share the games with rivals and has been accused of bundling the channel illegally with its ADSL service.