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PUBLISHER AND EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Nick Snow [email protected] MANAGING EDITOR Colin Mann [email protected] Opinion CONTRIBUTING EDITOR Chris Forrester [email protected] PUBLISHING ASSISTANT Nik Roseveare [email protected] ART EDITOR Steve Overbury [email protected] CONTRIBUTORS David del Valle - Madrid Pascale Paoli-Lebailly - Paris Branislav Pekic - Rome INSIGHT ASSOCIATES 3Vision ABI Research Ampere Analysis Decipher Media Consultants Digital TV Research Futuresource Consulting MIDiA Research Omdia Parks Associates PP Foresight SNL Kagan Strategy Analytics SALES DIRECTOR Sanjeev Bhavnani [email protected] PUBLISHED BY Advanced Television Limited Unit N202 Vox Studios 1-45 Durham Street London SE11 5JH Tel: [phone] www.advanced-television.com PRINTED BY Micropress Printers Limited Reydon Business Park, Fountain Way, Reydon, Southwold IP18 6DH Tel: [phone] [email protected] © Advanced Television Limited 2020. All rights reserved. Reproduction without permission is prohibited. EUROMEDIA This issue contains our annual CPE survey. Of course, things being what they are, subscribers at home have spent a lot more time than usual surveying their own CPE and have put it through some heavy lifting with extra viewing, home schooling and home working. Generally speaking, the early fears that the network infrastructure would struggle, or even fail, under the pressure have proved unfounded. Several global streaming services generously cut their bitrates so that pipes wouldn’t be too crowded. I didn’t notice any of them adding that this would also save them on their power bills. Anyone know if they have gone back to full-fat UHD yet? It’s probably a little early to tell if CPE has held up as well, particularly in a ‘new normal’ where truck rolls are frowned on, and not just because of the cost. Certainly, in future, there will be an increased premium on reliability, self-diagnosis and self-healing. And when none of that works, it must be easier to get in touch with providers and less painful to extract useful information. Millions are spent on reliability and diagnosis in order to improve QoE and cut churn. But I can’t be the only one to wonder whether much of this falls down when the rubber of expert analysis meets the road of user’s real experience. How often do after-sales managers, for instance, simply Google what are the most common problems with their kit or service? I have a Smart TV, a pay-TV service and several SVoDs. Suddenly the TV tells me it is connected, but there is no Internet. But there clearly is, as the pay-TV service, all other devices, and one of the SVoDs is fine, but none of the others will work. So, try all the usual power-off and restarts; nothing. Just before the remote is launched out the window, try Google. Two minutes later it is revealed this is common. All SVoDs – except, maddeningly one - need the clock on the Smart TV to coordinate with the network but, if there’s been a power cut it won’t automatically hook up. All you need do is go to clock settings and tell it to use network time – everything comes on. How difficult is it to either make the TV reset to network time whenever power if off or, at least, point out that when there is a connection problem this is often the solution. There is no hour you will never get back that you resent more than the one you spent sorting that out. ISSN 1477-8092 EUROMEDIA 3