UK lagging behind Europe in IPTV take up
Worldwide IPTV market doubles
The UK is lagging behind its European neighbours in the adoption of IPTV although the worldwide market has doubled, according to market watcher Point Topic.
The analyst has claimed that worldwide IPTV subscribers increased to three million during the year to 30 June, compared with 1.5 million the previous year.
John Bosnell, senior analyst at Point Topic, told CRN that France was leading the pack in IPTV take up, but the technology has yet to take off in the UK.
“There are a lot of pay TV subscribers in the UK because of Sky satellite services and cable which makes IPTV harder to sell, but this wasn’t necessarily the case in other European countries,” he said. “The BT IPTV vision has only just launched in the UK, so it remains to be seen how well it will do.”
Point Topic’s findings support figures from analyst iSuppli which predicted IPTV subscribers would rocket to 63 million by 2010 (CRN Online, 22 September).
Yehia Oweiss, vice-president of EMEA sales at TV card vendor Hauppauge, said: “Sky has been overtaken by Freeview, which is attractive to consumers because it is not subscription based. Because IPTV is subscription based it might not be as attractive. We see IPTV as just another medium, although the biggest growth is still in terrestrial TV.”