DVB steps strongly in an environment of growth of OTT services

Phil Laven, chairman of the DVB Project, highlighted at the opening of DVB World 2013 that the adoption of DVB-T2 by Russia and India will open new avenues to achieve an economy of scale that reduces the price of set top boxes.

Phil Laven, chairman of the DVB Project, has inaugurated DVB World 2013, ensuring that this digital format continues to grow at a considerable rate. Laven has highlighted that the adoption of DVB-T2 by Russia and India will open new avenues to achieve an economy of scale that reduces the price of set top boxes.

For his part, Lieven Vermaele, director of technology and innovation at the EBU, has stated that the use of the brand, applications and contextual experience will be the keys to linear, multimedia/social and non-linear broadcasting in a multi-device environment.

Vermaele has drawn attention to the fact that in the European Union currently 233 minutes per person per day are consumed on linear TV compared to 22 on non-linear TV. In 2020, non-linear consumption is expected to have risen to 40 minutes compared to 223 in linear.
One aspect that the EBU director has addressed is the cost of unicast streaming compared to broadcasting, wondering who is going to support the cost of these infrastructures that support a strong rise in streaming. “Will it be the telcos, the taxpayers, the users or the players…?” Vermaele has proposed, betting on an understanding between telcos and broadcasters.

Jordi Bosom, director of strategy and business development at Hispasat, has shared with the participants in DVB World 2013 the experience of the satellite operator in the distribution of Internet and television in high-speed mobility.

Bosom has drawn attention to the fact that consumers are willing to pay if they are offered HD or 4K quality or a personalized and enriched offer.

Despite the expected expansion of OTT services, according to Jordi Bosom, the satellite will maintain or even increase its share. Although new habits such as the second screen or social TV will experience strong growth, linear consumption will grow for live events, collective viewing and online socialization, maintains Bosom.

From the compression point of view, consider that the DVB-S2 extensions will allow working at 64 APSK FEC 9/10, expecting more than 175 Mbps for 36 MHz compared to the 130 Mbps for 36 MHz of the current DVB-S2 or the 43 Mbps for 36MHz of the primitive DVB-S.

Finally, Bosom has assured that "linear services are better provided through traditional networks such as cable or satellite, due to their greater capacity, better optimization for live events and better coverage. Satellite is a very good option for linear content distribution due to its global coverage, high bandwidth, rapid deployment, easy installation and effective cost."

Sky Germany and ZDF

Oliver Lewis, vice president of strategy at Sky Germany, has highlighted innovation as an incentive for the take-off of pay TV. Sky, which had 3.3 million subscribers at the end of 2012 with the broadcast of very exclusive content on 70 channels (64 in high definition), is making a strong commitment to multiplatform distribution on satellite, cable, internet, mobile devices and IPTV (since summer of this year) in the majority of homes in Germany and Austria.

Lewis has reviewed some Sky experiences on social TV and in 4K, such as the broadcast of the match between FC Bayern Munich and Borussia Dortmund last December.

Andreas Bereczky (ZDF), has presented the experience of the German broadcaster that, on the occasion of the London Games, carried out the regular broadcast along with seven additional live signals in IP streaming with Ericsson coding

For Bereczky, the added value for the IP audience is found in the EPG, the contextualized information and the possibility of rewinding. All of this has been carried out by ZDF with the existing infrastructure, and with minimal adjustments to the media management systems,
In his speech, Bereczky drew attention to some obstacles in the development of hybrid TV, such as the fact that HbbTv does not support protocols such as RTSP (Real time Streaming Protocol). The ZDF manager has recommended “not working with a YouTube mentality but with a television mentality.”

The RTVE experience

The day on June was closed by Pere Vila, director of planning and innovation at RTVE, who highlighted that in Spain there are 17.1 million homes with DTT, which represents a penetration of 98%. Vila drew attention to the idiosyncrasy of network deployment in Spain due to the orography, pointing out that DTT reaches homes thanks to 4,060 poles. Of these emission centers, 3,752 have an emitter of less than 5W and only 30 have more than 1,000W.

Regarding consumption, Vila emphasized that DTT continues to be the main choice of viewers since of the 269 minutes per person per day consumed on TV, 219 are dedicated to DTT, compared to 30 for cable or 10 for platforms such as satellite.

For the director of planning and innovation at RTVE, although broadband represents competition for traditional broadcasters, it will also be an ally in the distribution of content.

In this regard, RTVE has been experimenting with hybrid television for a year under HbbTV, currently offering a regular DTT service for Spain and by satellite for the rest of Europe.

Vila has also highlighted the experience that the public Corporation carried out a few days ago with an enriched second-screen follow-up of the Isabel series. More than 24,000 users interacted with this application last week.

Another field of experimentation for TVE is 4K over DVB-T2, carrying out broadcast tests in MPEG-4 at 35 Mbps. In the demonstration area of ​​DVB World 2013 we can attend a broadcast demonstration through Hispasat with compression at 17 Mbps and Sapec coding.