Demand Exceeding Supply in Digital TV Services.............
allnetdevices.com
By Matthew A. Peretz
Senior Editor
allNetDevices.com
February 13, 2001
Digital TV service providers appear to be falling behind growing demand, according to a study by IDC. In a recently released study entitled, 'Digital Set-Top Boxes: Worldwide Forecast and Analysis, 2000-2004,' IDC estimated that by 2004, shipments of the set-top boxes (STBs) will reach 70 million worldwide. Twenty-four million of these will be in the United States.
Mary Joy Scafidi, senior analyst for IDC's Consumer Devices Program, stated that, "Demand for digital TV exceeds - and will continue to exceed - the expectations of many large digital TV service providers. However, digital cable services cannot be implemented without hybrid fiber/coax network replacement from the cable head end to local nodes." Results of the industry analysis indicate, according to IDC, that the TV service providers themselves must commit financially and invest in the infrastructure changes.
Analysts at IDC believe that there are numerous revenue streams available to the service providers once the infrastructure is in place. These include video-on-demand, television commerce, email, enhanced programming, online gaming, and unified messaging. Scafidi also stated that uptake among consumers will depend on service providers educating them about digital TV and its uses.
According to IDC, service providers have been reluctant to deploy digital TV, largely because of the high-manufacturing costs of the set-top boxes. However, the latest set-top boxes are being designed at a much lower cost and can support the revenue-generating applications and upgrades. |
