Telemar 1 a private Brazilian telecom operator serving three-quarters of a million subscribers, plans to announce its preferred platform for offering IPTV - Internet Protocol TV (Internet TV) services before the end of August. The operator plans to test IPTV with up to a thousand users this year ahead of a full-blown launch in 2007. It has short-listed three manufacturers to provide it with equipment and although it has not named names, the leading contenders are though to be a joint initiative by French equipment supplier Alcatel and US software giant Microsoft.
Telefonica de Brasil (Telesp), which passed one million DSL subscribers in 2005, was the first Telefonica subsidiary to launch an RFP (Request for Proposals) for IPTV and a small trial is progressing slowly. And Brasil Telecom, with its 900,000 ADSL lines, has already shown a taste for the video business with its VOD-over-public-Internet service, offering sports, music and lifestyle programming. A number of telcos are working to get the Brazilian government to deregulate video and IPTV market.
Facing increasing competition from mobile phones and the resurgent cable industry, Brazilian fixed operators are getting ready to deploy IPTV. While the challenges for Brazilian IPTV will be numerous, not all is lost of for fixed operators. The primary value proposition of IPTV is as a broadband solution bundled in triple- or quadruple-play packages. The relatively low pay-TV penetration in Brazil therefore represents an opportunity for the country’s operators, who may be able to use IPTV as a catalyst for pay-TV expansion.
IPTV is becoming part of our culture a long time ago before the brazilian government have chosen the japanese DTV digital television system wich is expected to bring the digital television to 92 million recievers spread abroad Brazil´s 8,500,000 sq km.
Brazilian Internet Television has been tested in various ways in the last 4 years (as well by mobile phones operators). There are too many good examples of television services over DSL in Brazil and now it is time to acheive commercial success among broadband subscribers. Websites like Globomediacenter by Globo.com and Bandnews are broadcasting their signal through Internet at DSL speed to the world.
[1] Telemar Norte Leste S.A. (Public, SAO:TMAR5) is engaged in telecommunication services in Brazil. The Company is a specialty provider of local and long-distance landline telephone networks for residential, small business and corporate clients. In addition, it offers international fixed telephony, public telephones, Internet services, videoconferences, image messages and data communications.
Thursday, July 20, 2006
