DTH
Old box new tricks as OneTV reboots legacy set tops with a smart spin
MUMBAI: Who says you can’t teach an old box new tricks? In a bold leap that’s both tech-savvy and eco-conscious, Hungary’s leading TV provider One Hungary has rolled out a major upgrade to its OneTV service without replacing a single set-top box. That’s right: legacy devices, some over ten years old, have been brought back to life with an all-new next-gen interface, delivering a streaming experience that rivals the flashiest new gear.
The revamp, delivered in partnership with 3 Screen Solutions (3SS), brings the award-winning 3Ready platform to more than 400,000 households across Hungary. The result? A sleek, intuitive UI, seamless content discovery, personalised recommendations, and access to big-league apps like Netflix, Prime Video and Youtube all from the comfort of those trusty old black boxes gathering dust under TV stands.
3SS managing director Kai-Christian Borchers said, “We are delighted with the achievement to migrate One Hungary’s customers onto the new One TV service platform. We offer huge congratulations to One Hungary for accomplishing this project that demonstrates commitment to innovation, and to providing the best possible service to customers, new and old.”
Sagemcom senior executive VP for audio video Solutions Business Unit Olivier Taravel said, “We are extremely proud that One Hungary selected the Sagemcom platform to deliver its next-generation OneTV service to Hungarian subscribers. We look forward to our ongoing collaboration with 3SS to help One Hungary enable consumers to enjoy a truly world-class entertainment service.”
One Hungary, part of the telecom giant 4iG Group, is in the final stages of consolidating four major service providers under one umbrella. The move marks a massive infrastructure evolution and positions the group as Hungary’s second-largest full-service telecom player. The OneTV upgrade is a centrepiece of that transformation, proving that good tech can be good for the planet too.
Technical wizardry aside, the platform also taps into NAGRA’s OpenTV Video Platform and security stack, enabling OneTV to act as a super-aggregator blending live TV, OTT, catch-up, and SVOD into one unified playground. Throw in support for regional favourites like RTL+ and HBO Max, and you’ve got a service that speaks fluently to local and global tastes alike.
The magic behind the scenes includes LightningJS, a lean, responsive UI framework optimised for low-spec devices and a Sagemcom hybrid STB built around Broadcom’s 72604 chip. It’s fast, flexible, and fully future-ready.
So next time your telly feels a little dated, don’t bin the box just reboot it. As OneTV proves, the future of television doesn’t always mean starting from scratch. Sometimes, it’s just about thinking inside the box.
DTH
Prasar Bharati’s WAVES earns Rs 2.9 crore in first year
Platform scales content, users but monetisation gaps limit revenue growth.
MUMBAI: Big waves, small ripples at least for now. When Prasar Bharati launched its OTT platform WAVES at the 55th International Film Festival of India in November 2024, it pitched a bold vision: a homegrown rival to global and domestic streaming giants, blending video, audio, gaming and commerce into a single digital ecosystem. Five months into FY2024–25, however, the platform’s revenue stands at just Rs 2.90 crore, a figure that underscores the gap between ambition and monetisation.
On paper, WAVES looks anything but modest. The platform has ingested 13,608 titles, totalling 9,495 hours of content, with over 13,000 titles already live. It has streamed more than 575 live events from the Mahakumbh Amrit Snan and the 76th Republic Day parade to the Hockey India League, Kabaddi World Cup and Mann Ki Baat while offering 74 live TV channels and 12 radio channels. With over 10 lakh registered users and more than 200 content partners onboarded, the scale resembles that of a fully operational streaming service rather than a pilot project.
The architecture supporting this scale is equally robust. Built under Prasar Bharati’s Central Archives vertical, WAVES runs on a cloud-based infrastructure with DRM, encryption and an integrated analytics dashboard. It includes dedicated units for content ingestion, quality control, publishing, graphics, marketing and billing, and is distributed across platforms such as OTTplay, Tata Play and BSNL. The offering extends beyond video to include audio-on-demand, e-games and even e-commerce via ONDC integration.
Yet, the numbers reveal a core disconnect. Despite its scale, WAVES generated just Rs 2.90 crore in a market where India’s OTT industry crossed Rs 23,000 crore in 2024. A key bottleneck lies in monetisation infrastructure: subscriptions cannot currently be purchased within the app and must be completed via an external website. In a mobile-first country where over 95 per cent of OTT consumption happens on smartphones, this extra step creates friction that most users are unlikely to overcome.
Ironically, content is not the problem, it is the platform’s biggest strength. Prasar Bharati holds one of the world’s richest broadcast archives, including 45,154 hours of digitised Akashvani programming and 35,723 hours from Doordarshan. For WAVES alone, over 3,800 hours of archival content have been made OTT-ready, including classics such as Ramayan and Shaktimaan, alongside rare cultural recordings and historical broadcasts.
There are early signs that this library holds commercial potential. Revenue from archival content licensing rose sharply to Rs 3.38 crore in FY24, up from Rs 67 lakh the previous year. Meanwhile, free digital platforms continue to drive massive reach, the PB Archives Youtube channel clocked 119.78 million views and added 4,02,000 subscribers in FY2024–25, crossing 1.7 million in total, while DD News has over 5.84 million subscribers.
That, however, presents a strategic dilemma. While free distribution builds scale, it also conditions audiences to expect content at zero cost making it harder to transition to paid models. WAVES, designed as a hybrid AVOD-SVOD platform with advertising and subscription layers, is yet to fully crack this balance.
The broader challenge is not technological but strategic. In an ecosystem dominated by platforms offering seamless payments, aggressive pricing and high-budget originals, WAVES is still bridging the gap between being a content repository and a commercially viable product.
For now, the platform reflects both promise and paradox. It has the scale, the content and the infrastructure but until monetisation catches up, WAVES remains less a revenue engine and more a digital showcase of what India’s public broadcaster could become.
