New MRG IPTV Global Report Forecasts 14.3 Million Subscribers in 2007 and 63.6 Million in 2011

Microsoft Middleware Users Experience Continued Delays

    SUNNYVALE, Calif., May 14 /PRNewswire/ -- The steady growth of IPTV
 subscribers and service revenue continues on an upward trend in Europe and
 Asia and, to some extent, in North America, according to the new MRG report
 IPTV Global Forecast Report-April 2007.
     Driving the market's successful growth in the past 6 months is fast
 growth in Europe, especially France, Belgium, Spain, Italy and Eastern
 Europe; in Asia, especially China, Japan, and Hong Kong; and in North
 America, especially Verizon, the IOCs (Independent Operating Companies) and
 Canada. "Our forecast shows service provider revenue growing from $3.6
 billion in 2007 to $20.3 billion in 2011," states Len Feldman, Director of
 IPTV Analysis for MRG. "Europe continues to be the biggest market for IPTV,
 with France easily leading the growth spurt through IPTV operators Free,
 Orange France Telecom and Neuf Cegetel."
     "Success is also driven by seasoned operators who have mastered
 critical competitive operations like continuous quality improvement and
 content negotiations," states Gary Schultz, MRG President. "By mastering
 these challenges, the experienced operators are successfully
 differentiating themselves and moving into sustained growth periods."
     The underachieving operators continue to be those, like AT&T and
 Deutsche Telecom, who rely on Microsoft's beleaguered middleware that has
 been "architecturally challenged" with its inability to scale. The report
 conjectures that further delays at AT&T will result in replacement of the
 MS middleware by mid-to-late 2007. However, the lack of MPEG-4/AVC set-top
 box chips, which was causing a drag on the market in late 2006, has been
 resolved, and should result in a continued uptake through 2007.
     Tracking over 570 total IPTV operators worldwide, the report analyzes
 capital spending by four regions and by seven IPTV product sectors,
 including Access, Video Headends, VOD, Content-Protection, Middleware,
 Set-top Boxes and System-Integration. The report also includes capital
 spending detail of the top 25 global service providers.
     The (74-page) IPTV Global Forecast Report-April 2007 is available in
 printed format for $3,995.00 US; as a Departmental PDF license for
 $5,200.00 US; and is available free as part of MRG's IPTV Tracking Service.
 For more information or to order the report, contact Rob Smith at
 408-524-9767 or rsmith@mrgco.com, or visit http://www.mrgco.com.
 
 

SOURCE Multimedia Research Group, Inc.