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Mobile & Wireless
CTIA: Is DVB-H the Way to Go?
Handsets and spectrum will be key, argues O2 CTO
by Ouida Taaffe
How mobile operators will actually go about offering mobile
TV - whether with unicast, DVB-H or MediaFLO - is still an
open question, but the final choice may well be made by
device manufacturers, argues the CTO of O2.
"The key to decision making," argues Dave Williams, the CTO
of O2, speaking at the CTIA Wireless show in Las Vegas, "Is
what device manufacturers think. The handset is king in the
end-user side of the industry."
That does not mean, however, that Williams does not see
pros and cons to the technological solutions on offer. "We
believe that the 3G networks will not be reliable enough.
There is no room in TV for dropped calls," says
Williams. "That is why we think a broadcast service [without
complex hand-offs] will be the way forward."
O2 ran a trial of mobile TV in Oxford at the end of 2005.
Three hundred and seventy-five people took part, watching
on average for 23 minutes per session, and having one to
two sessions per day. The technology used was Nokia’s DVB-H
(digital video broadcasting - handheld) solution. This relies
on a broadcast signal being picked up by a digital TV receiver
mounted in a Nokia smartphone (the 7710 in this case). This
approach is in contrast to unicast streaming over GPRS and
3G networks.
However, DVB-H and unicast are not the only shows in town.
Qualcomm, the CDMA chip manufacturer, offers the MediaFLO
solution. "MediaFLO is a quality viewing experience," says
Rob Chandhok, vice president of engineering at Qualcomm,
also speaking at CTIA. The aim, Chandhok says, "is to bring
very popular content out at a mass-media price point. This,
and making it an interactive device, is the predominant use
case for mobile TV."
The FLO technology is independent of the air-interface so
both CDMA2000/EV-DO and UMTS/HSDPA operators could
implement it. At present, it is supported on handsets by
Samsung and it can deliver up to 20 streaming channels of
QVGA-quality video (that is 320/240 pixels) at up to 30
frames per second. This is a much higher spec than that
currently supported by Nokia. Nokia’s dedicated mobile TV
device, the N92, copes with just 15 frames per second and
has 128/96 pixels. Qualcomm also aims to offer fast channel
switching time (on average of less than two seconds) and
lower handset power consumption (four hours of streaming
should be possible on a standard mobile, according to
Chandhok).
Qualcomm is also bullish on the wider business case for
MediaFLO. "An operator in a mid-sized Western European
country could see a [positive] US$200 m difference in capital
outlay between MediaFLO and DVB-H," says Chandhok. "We
thought we could make such a difference in the business case
that it was worth doing."
However, not all of the factors that might determine
technology choice are within the operator’s control, as
Williams pointed out - and it is not just the end-user that
could call the shots. "The business case depends on what
spectrum is allocated," says Williams. "If we could get the
appropriate spectrum, then DVB-H and MediaFLO are two we
would look at."
Willams added that he sees MediaFLO as primarily US-centric,
principally because there is already the appropriate spectrum
(700MHz) available nationwide. However, Williams also
stressed that the business case will hinge on what people will
pay for and that the handsets will have to be affordable. As of
now, devices using Qualcomm technology have tended to be
in the higher price brackets.
What might happen in Europe where there is no cross-
continent agreement on spectrum availability was not
discussed. Interestingly, the CTO of Ericsson, Hakan Eriksson,
mentioned that the largest single European operator,
Vodafone, has "moved away" from DVB-H and is "clearly on a
unicast track".
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