The annual DVB World summit, which took place in Munich, was mainly focused on DVB-I, a specification to enable hybrid and next-generation television and video services. After many years in development, there was a sense that its time might finally be coming. For the DVB Project, which has been developing standards for over three decades, it is of existential importance.
Remo Vogel, introduced the DVB World summit, in his first year as chair of the DVB Project, having led the German DVB-I pilot.
Broadcasters in Germany, including ARD, ZDF, RTL Deutschland, and ProSiebenSat.1, are preparing plans for a market launch of DVB-I. They have convened a ‘round table’ to organise their initiative, while a task force of the Deutsche TV-Plattform is developing a technical profile for receivers.
Spanish public broadcaster RTVE and the association of regional public media services FORTA are meanwhile planning to establish a new pilot for DVB-I. That follows pilots in Germany, Italy, and Ireland.
A delegation from China also expressed support for DVB-I, both in terms of pilot services and in producing compatible products for export markets.
There was a presentation on the Freely platform that has launched in the United Kingdom. Although it is a proprietary operator application, it makes use of very similar concepts to DVB-I, which in turn draws on the development of Freeview Play. That leaves the door open to support for DVB-I in the future.
Satellite operators have been early adopters of DVB-I. The Eutelsat Sat.tv Connect platform makes use of DVB-I for service announcement and discovery. SES also showed an end-to-end implementation of a DVB-I via satellite solution.
Anixenet, based in Greece, presented a proof of concept for service delivery over as 5G Broadcast network, supported by DVB-I.
DVB-I works well with HbbTV, which now has integrated support for DVB-I. There is a clear need for a common device profile that specifies minimum requirements for the support of both, together with DVB-DASH and baseline requirements for digital rights management.
DVB-I is also complementary to DVB-NIP, or Native IP, which aims to facilitate the integration of internet protocols with broadcast systems.
The Service List Registry is developing an Application Programming Interface for a Unified Service Platform, which is intended to facilitate the deployment and adoption of DVB-I.
To date, deployment has been limited by a lack of availability of commercially available televisions with native support for DVB-I. Vestel has been an early supporter, but there were indications that they will be joined by a number of other major manufacturers.
A number of ‘unconference’ sessions also covered DVB-I, reflecting the increasing interest in the specification. After many years in development, it seems that its time might be coming.
Given the apparent proliferation of television platforms and operating systems, the essential advantage of a solution like DVB-I is that it is not owned by, and therefore controlled by, a single corporation. In the current political climate, that might seem increasingly important to those that value media freedom.
At the close of the conference there was a presentation of a fellowship to David Wood, a pioneer at the EBU and DVB, who reflected on the development of digital television over thirty years ago. The DVB Project was instrumental in delivering digital television to hundreds of millions of homes around the world.
As the world moves to internet technologies, there is still a role for co-ordinating specifications related to audio and video delivery. For the DVB Project, DVB-I simply has to succeed, in which case DVB specifications could remain relevant for decades to come.