(27 October 2007 6:00 pm)

MUMBAI: India will have one million IPTV subscribers by 2011 but for it to succeed companies need to get their act together in the areas of access, content and technology.

This was a point made at the IBE 2007 Conference in a session that examined IPTV's growth prospects in India. The speakers were IOL wholetime director AS Oberoi, Seachange India MD Vishwajeet Deshmukh and MTNL's Vandana Sethi.

Oberoi notes that IOL offers a content delivery network to MTNL and BSNL. IOL launched commercial operations in August in Mumbai, Kolkata and Bangalore. It has also launched trial operations in other cities like Chennai.

In terms of access, companies need to have fibre optic infrastructure. A strong DRM system is also needed; otherwise, content owners will be wary pf parting with their offerings.

Oberoi says that IPTV offers the most robust DRM system which has made it easier for the company to deal with the Hollywood studios. Its VoD service offers thousands of English and Hindi movies. It has also tied up with companies like Satyam for e-learning. As time goes by, the company will also offer games on demand and music on demand.

He adds that IOL has deals with several firms. They include Seachange which offers servers, Amino for set top boxes and Cisco for routers. HP will help with IOL's Internet data Centre.

Sethi notes that IPTV allows for time shift viewing of television. HDTV can also be transmitted on the same network, provided it is modified accordingly. She notes that newer compression standards are available for more effective video delivery. The challenge is that customers are demanding and will not compromise on the quality of service.