Q&A Broadband Forum Photo courtesy of Shutterstock. Talking IPTV & broadband The Broadband Forum and its members are constantly working to enable home, business and converged broadband services through interoperability, architecture and management and recommendations best practice. As we await the latest IPT V figures, Helen Jameson spoke to Robin Mersh, Chief Operating Of ficer of the Broadband Forum about IPT V adoption, areas of growth and the issue of broadband penetration. Question: As COO of the Broadband Forum, how do you view IPTV adoption across the world? Do you believe that IPTV can realistically rival other delivery platforms such as DTH and cable? Robin Mersh: That is quite a question! It depends what you mean by rival. There is no doubt that there are areas where IPTV delivery has been strong, well organised, and where the broadband network is at a level where IPTV delivery has worked well. In these areas it has provided effective competition to other video delivery options. You can tell by the reaction of competing com- panies. The cable companies are the ones that probably react the most strongly because IPTV presents very regional competition. I think satellite providers have a different attitude towards it, because there are a lot of very good commercial relationships between the telecommunication companies and the satellite companies. However, you can certainly see the reaction from the cable companies in the regions where IPTV delivery has been strong. It is probably fair to say that IPTV deployments have been most successful where the network conditions are right for it to happen. It is important to know that there are different regulatory environments in every territory and this can play a role and IPTV offers providers the options to really differentiate their service by offering different local channel line-ups which has been very compelling. Some regions have simply got there quicker than others, but the rest are catching up. Question: What is the ideal recipe for successful IPTV deployment? What are the ideal conditions that IPTV needs to thrive? 42 w w w.satellite-evolution.com | September/October 2009 Robin.pmd 42 22/09/2009, 23:22