IPTV registers 45% growth in region

He said the Middle East is also showing signs of swift adoption of IPTV, with 45% year-on-year growth reported in 2008, bringing a number of new opportunities and challenges for the region's TV content providers.

"The Middle East has witnessed about 40% annual growth in IPTV demand for the past few years. The demand is being driven by the increasing availability of cutting-edge convergence technology across voice, data and multimedia solutions. METV will address these issues and more,"

said McGill, CEO, Nexus Global Events.

Recent reports suggest that worldwide, IPTV subscriptions are expected to top 65 million by 2012, a leap from the 13 million households, today. McGill observed that the massive growth curve has put the focus on finding new content for converged services across television, internet and mobile technology.

"Worldwide, the broadcast content sector is being pushed to find solutions to a huge content gap, and a real opportunity is developing for region-based companies to up-the-ante to help fill the void," he added.

He said the onslaught of convergence solutions has opened new business opportunities for innovative companies, and cited Etisalat, one of the two main telecommunications service providers in the United Arab Emirates, as a convergence technology pioneer.

Etisalat is reported to be in the finals stages of a fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) network covering the city of Abu Dhabi. The project, dubbed 'eLite', would make Abu Dhabi the first 100% FTTH-connected capital city in the world. Reports suggest that Dubai and Sharjah connectivity would follow swiftly.

McGill said that such moves will open up a number of new home entertainment options, including high-definition IPTV services, both broadcast and on-demand, online gaming and other new services such as e-education, online health check-ups, video conferencing and remote infrastructure management.

Neil Manwaring, Managing Director, Nexus Global Events highlighted that Internet is the base to launch converged media. He said that the Internet is witnessing a 20-25% rise in subscriber base and 50-100% increase in returns, every year, worldwide.

"Studies of usage show that converged networks and services keep the customer hooked to multiple services delivered by the same provider over the same medium, therefore cconverged solutions must be relevant, focussed, precise and abundant," Neil added.

Meanwhile, the global mobile entertainment market is expected to touch $50bn next year, with about 840 million subscribers using mobile phones as media players.

Manwaring said that the TV industry in the Middle East and North Africa must ensure that content production and management is part of its business model, with new content and enhanced channel services worked to increase customer loyalty and retention.

METV and Middle East Broadcast Solutions (MEBS), in association twofour54, Abu Dhabi's content creation community are slated to run concurrently over three days (from November 17 2009) at Abu Dhabi's National Exhibition Centre (ADNEC).
Pyramedia, Endemol, Star Dtv, Ginx TV, Eclipse Digital, Entertainment Masterclass, FRAPA, Dreamtek and Associated Press are named among the leading exhinitors.

The events will be complemented by a cutting-edge conference portfolio of leading speakers and experts including Jeff Kupski, president of Turner Broadcasting; Roland Willaert, CEO of Entertainment Masterclass; Dr Nashwa Al Ruwaini, CEO of Pyramedia; Barry Lederman, president of Eclipse Digital; Mark Hill, CEO of The Rights Lawyers, and Nick Grande, MD of Channel Sculptor.