Digital switchover for businesses

Mike Cuckow talks up TV applications for businesses

There has been a lot of publicity about the digital TV switchover but little of it has been aimed at businesses.

About half the UK has already switched over. The eastern side of the country, western Scotland and Northern Ireland are still analogue, and it will be more than a year before some areas go digital.

There are already plenty of satellite and TV specialist companies working towards this goal, but there is also a real advantage for resellers that understand how to use an existing IP network to deliver a high-quality TV signal. This can actually be used to develop a much bigger sales opportunity.

Businesses in buildings with co-axial cable will, like home owners, have to abandon their analogue TV set-up in favour of offerings that incorporate DVBT tuners. Resellers can provide a direct connection to digital sources so new TV channels, signage and information services can be viewed over the LAN or WAN.

Although many companies will have already gone digital, they may not have realised how much more they can do by bringing live news, financial bulletins or entertainment channels to desktop PCs and laptops or connected plasma screens and large-panel LCDs.

Typically, this type of TV distribution is popular with financial organisations such as brokers, banks and insurance providers, sport and leisure facilities, and media companies.

Resellers can recast digital signals and stream them in an IPTV-compatible format over an IP network. IPTV is growing quickly, and customers want quality commercial IPTV, HD and digital video applications.

Mike Cuckow is sales director of EMEA and Asia-Pacific for Cabletime