coverstory_cover story 20/08/2014 11:27 Page 5
and Playready functionality - with
a clear path to HEVC capabilities
- in our latest devices to ensure
our customers are able to
embrace all forms of content
delivery for their customers
efficiently and cost-effectively.
ARRIS: Personalised bundle
marketing means the subscriber
browsing experience is enhanced
- encouraging impulse purchases
and upgrades. With targeted
offers, pricing and discounts,
service providers have a way to evolve and
increase revenue with multi-screen
marketing.
Entone: The keys to a rich media experience
are high-speed IP connectivity, an open
applications platform that enables third party
app development, and a secure environment
for delivering premium content to authorised
recipients. Today, it’s about working with
partners that have strong relationships with
content and OTT providers. Of equal
importance is making sure that the devices
you deploy are compatible with the cloudbased TV future so that as these services
mature, you are well positioned to provide
them.
Farncombe: The application environment
running inside the home gateway is a key
enabler to allow access to a large range of
content and services, together with having
the adequate security solution. It is fair to
say that broadcast, premium and on demand
can relatively easily be provided by the
platform operator (the ISP, cable or the DTH
operator). However, for OTT services the
situation is more complicated as they can be
provided by many suppliers, and may be
using different solutions. As a result, it is
unlikely that home gateways will be able to
Connected devices
to top 2bn
The global installed base of
Connected TV devices
(including Smart TVs,
Games Consoles, Blu-ray
Players, Digital Media
Adapters and Set-Top
Boxes) will double over the
next five years exceeding 2
billion units by 2018
according to a Strategy
Analytics Connected Home
Devices (CHD) service
report.
Other key findings from
the report include:
20 EUROMEDIA
“Personalised bundle
marketing means the
subscriber browsing
experience is enhanced encouraging impulse
purchases and upgrades.”
cope with all services, unless a single OS was
to be used on all devices with an
interoperable security scheme, which is not
the case today. The other question to
consider is whether we need the home
gateway to access OTT services, given their
availability on connected devices and their
extension to the main screen TV set.
Freesat: In 2012, we launched the Freetime
service which brings together the best of
broadcast content with broadband services.
This includes a roll-back guide, catch-up
players from the major broadcasters, a range
of free and pay OTT services, and Showcase,
an editorial recommendation service. We are
working with STB and Smart TV
manufacturers to include Freetime in a wide
range of devices to suit different consumer
budgets and circumstances.
l IP connectivity is fast
becoming ubiquitous as IPenabled CE devices
accounted for 87% of all
CE devices shipped in
2013.
l Global households own
an average of 2.8
connected CE devices with
the USA seeing the highest
levels of ownership at 7.7
devices.
l Global retail spend on
Consumer Electronics
products will exceed $1
trillion for the first time in
2017.
l Average global retail
HGI: The Media Gateway can
enable premium content
consumption for retail devices,
while retaining the ability to
deliver services to legacy TV-sets
with a simplified type of STB.
In this use case, the Media
Gateway is able to translate from
one protocol to another, and
adapt content formats for each
new retail or legacy receiving
device, and fulfil CAS and DRM
requirements. It provides a
homogeneous user experience defined by the
service provider, and delivers functionality
that enables service providers to check that a
given rendering device has the right set of
capabilities or security for a given piece of
content.
Humax: With smart TV devices, the
operator is able to add not only premium
broadcast content but also key VoD and OTT
services, thus enabling a full suite of
available content for consumers.
Irdeto: As the number of platforms for
content consumption increases and
consumer habits evolve, operators will need
to demonstrate their flexibility and
willingness to try out new distribution
models and content ‘packaging’ offers. There
are as many ways to grow your business as
there are different TV markets, no single
recipe will work everywhere. We have seen
successful offerings range from OTT content
as part of the base subscription, to individual
per-event pricing for on-demand sports
coverage with everything in between.
Rovi: Our discovery products are designed
to be cross content, based on the b \