| "With
such intense competition among service providers, subscriber experience and quality
of service become key differentiators, compelling them to roll-out monitoring
systems and protocol analyzers at the same time as they launch their IPTV services,"
remarks Frost & Sullivan industry manager Jessy Cavazos. "This factor
is considered to be a strong driver, particularly for the network monitoring systems
market segment, and is expected to have a very high impact on market revenues
throughout the forecast period." Tolerance
levels in IP video services are minimal compared to VoIP services, in which the
conversation can be continued even if a couple of packets are lost. Thus, it becomes
highly essential to have effective monitoring and troubleshooting tools when networks
are deployed in the present market scenario, increasing the demand for suitable
test equipment. Again,
the emphasis on quality is higher in the IP video and TV market than in the VoIP
market. This poses a significant challenge to test equipment providers catering
to this market. The capital costs of the test equipment used for IPTV and video
are very high, running into billions of dollars. Since these costs eventually
get passed on to the users, it is hardly surprising that they demand the highest
quality possible to get maximum value from the service. The
challenge for test equipment providers is to keep pace with the latest technologies
in IP video and TV and to be able to develop suitable solutions to test them. "With
end users looking at channel change time issues before roll-out and measuring
channel change infrastructure in networks after deployment, this presents a significant
opportunity for test vendors," says Cavazos. "Frost & Sullivan believes
that channel changing performance test to assess the functioning of one or more
devices under test (DUT) or systems under test (SUT) in IPTV deployment is the
biggest opportunity, from a customer target application perspective, in the near
future." | 
