Special Report
boxes, which combine both a satellite or
terrestrial receiver with at least a return path
Case study - Telenor
over an existing telephone line, and possibly Leading Scandinavian telco Telenor is implementing IPTV in Norway, Sweden and Denmark,
some online services through a broadband
with headend integration, SmartVision service platform and a choice of STBs from Thomson.
connection, either of their own or through a
One of the primary drivers in Telenor deciding on an end to end solution was that it means
third party. The hybrid solution could, for
Thomson can offer a quality of service standard which is meaningful because it understands
example, combine push VoD via the broadcast
every element of the delivery.
signal with pull VoD online.
The international scope of the multi-country system added to its complexity. As noted
The important point is that Thomson can
above, Telenor is looking at delivering a readily expandable offering, for example by
meet all these markets in pre-integrated
including HTML middleware portals in the STBs at present, but being ready to migrate to
solutions. What we mean by that is that all
Flash in the future. Its plans for deployment are aggressive and Telenor, already the largest
distributor of traditional DTH and cable television services in the Nordic region, is determined
the technology exists, from headend to home
to be a major player in IPTV too.
gateway, and can be put together in a factory
"IPTV is an essential service in Telenor’s future offering to our customers," said Witold
demonstration immediately, ready for almost
Sitek, CTO for Telenor’s Nordic region. "Our choice of Thomson was largely based on their
instant rollout. The operator saves time and
proven experience and their capability to offer a competitive integrated technical solution
money, getting to market faster and easier.
with a promising future roadmap in this rapidly evolving area."
Service management Video on demand offerings could be parallel and tested securely before release.
pushed to individual subscribers, for example, Triple play services are even more
The central part of any such system is the based on their previous viewing history. With dependent upon tight end to end integration.
service management platform. The Thomson direct connection to the Internet through the The facility that initially attracts audiences is
SmartVision platform is the most successful same STB or gateway, the consumer could be on-screen caller ID, with the ability, from the
in the world at present, with more than 1.5 directed to specific e-commerce sites (which television remote, to accept a call (initiating
million subscribers under its control. earn the operator commission). an instant PVR or network PVR record), divert
Most important, it is network agnostic. The VoD and related functionality is seen as it to another phone in a different room, or
same platform can control IPTV over any the killer application for IPTV. The Thomson reject the call. This seemingly simple
medium, including mobile television. It is a SmartVision platform has its own VoD server functionality needs a tight link between the
convergent platform: as you add services, so which can be added to the network, with voice system and the video delivery system.
their management can be coordinated through decentralised storage to optimise the impact Eventually this will be extended to quad
SmartVision. It provides control over both the on the infrastructure. Although we talk about play, with convergence between fixed line and
technology and the services, with interfaces to video on demand, a better expression is ‘TV mobile telephony coming into play. An
external systems as required. The platform is anytime’, as the same hardware can deliver operator could, for instance, send a trailer to
readily scalable and entirely customisable, conventional video on demand, network PVR, the mobile phone of a subscriber to watch on
from the way that channels are added to the start-over TV, pause-TV, catch-up TV and so the commute home, hoping they will click on
online portal that allows subscribers to on. the mobile to order the full movie download
manage their own accounts. The key to the success of these offerings is to the home to watch on television that night.
Thomson is also the world leader in set-top to make them as near transparent as possible Achieving this will depend on the
boxes, measured by the number of devices to the consumer. SmartVision and the set-top widespread adoption of new standards such as
deployed. It has a range of standard products box or gateway working together can create IMS, and Thomson is taking a very active role
which can be adapted to meet the exact needs the seamless viewing experience that in their development. Today proof of concept
of every service. Most important, if an audiences expect. Most important, the service demonstrations of true quad play services can
operator chooses both Thomson STBs and operator, over whatever platform or be given, and the technology will be ready to
SmartVision, then the way the service is platforms, controls the roadmap so the roll out when operators develop their
delivered and accessed by the consumer can functionality for each element is developed in commercial models for it.
be controlled very tightly.
As an example, a basic STB might include Case study - Smart Telecom
embedded middleware. This can offer a high
Smart Telecom is pursuing an aggressive approach to expanding its offering. Founded in 2000
degree of functionality, including a Flash
to bring a new competitiveness to the telecoms industry in Ireland, it built a new national
portal and the ability to share content with
fibre backbone and unbundled local loops in the 37 biggest exchanges in the country to
other devices, as well as the basics such as
deliver uncontended ADSL2+ to the home, as well as voice over IP using Thomson Cirpack
EPG generation. For many markets, such as
soft switches.
pure digital terrestrial television, this may
With a strong customer base already established it added IPTV, again with a headend and
well be enough.
service management from Thomson. Smart Telecom elected to use MPEG-4 compression from
But if the operator has ambitions to extend the start which, thanks to the Thomson ViBE encoder and its Mustang digital signal
the service offering it may consider a hybrid processing chip, can be delivered in the minimum possible bandwidth without compromising
set-top box. This will still have embedded quality. "We could not have done IPTV without it," said to Smart Telecom’s Ronan Kelly.
middleware, but also the ability to accept Because it started as a triple play service the Smart Telecom IPTV network already has
instructions from SmartVision to add
advanced functionality such as the caller ID options. That has not stopped Smart Telecom
additional functionality and presentations,
from moving forward and it is now introducing new technical options to increase both the
helping the operator sell new services to the
user-friendliness of the service and its robustness, including Thomson’s unique fast channel
consumer and raise ARPU.
change function and advanced forward error correction.
september 2008
iptv 23 guide2iptv
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