Two reports are out this week on IPTV, one counting numbers as they are today published by Canalys, putting existing customers at 3.6 million and revenues at around $1.2 billion, with around 2.4 million of those customers in Europe.
The other report is from Strategy Analytics and says the starting point is just under 6 million homes today worldwide, and says it will reach more than 80 million homes, but with only 40.9 million of then paying for TV, by the end of 2011.
Canalys says that Western Europe accounts for two-thirds of worldwide IPTV subscribers with the top five IPTV providers accounting for just over 60% of the market, but it thinks that 2007 will see accelerated growth in Asia and North America. It says that most major incumbent telecoms providers have launched commercial IPTV services and the market is becoming increasingly competitive with the entry of alternative operators, such as ISPs and energy companies.
The top three providers globally according to Canalys are PCCW on 18.2% share, France Telecom with 16.8% and Free Telecom on 14.0%. These are joined in the top five by Telefonica in Spain and Fastweb in Italy.
In 2007, Canalys predicts significant uptake of IPTV in the Asia Pacific region. Hong Kong is already a mature IPTV market, and growth will come from emerging markets such as China and India, following large investments into IPTV deployments there. Australia and North America will be another major growth area, with AT&T and Verizon already pushing nationwide roll-outs of IPTV services.
The Strategy Analytics report, entitled ‘Global IPTV Forecast: Homes, Users and Subscribers,’ finds that many subscribers to IPTV will not be paying directly for TV programming or services, but will use IPTV free-of-charge as part of a package of bundled broadband services.
Well we understand bundles, but not the idea of selling IPTV for free and just where 6 million installs come from we’re not sure, so we’d take the Strategy Analytics report with a pinch of salt and take the Canalys one more seriously until Faultline writes its own report.