Europe will overtake the U.S. as the world’s largest digital TV market by 2006, with 63 million digital homes.
The UK will retain its position as the most developed digital TV market in Europe, with continuing growth of Sky’s satellite platform and the success of Freeview combining to boost digital penetration to 82% by the end of 2008.
Europe will overtake the U.S. as the world’s largest digital TV market by 2006, with 63 million digital homes.
The UK will retain its position as the most developed digital TV market in Europe, with continuing growth of Sky’s satellite platform and the success of Freeview combining to boost digital penetration to 82% by the end of 2008.
The prediction comes in a report by Datamonitor, Digital TV Markets 2004: development of the Western European and US markets to 2008.
The report notes that following disappointing levels of development in 2001 and 2002, the European and US digital TV markets exhibited renewed subscriber growth in 2003.
By the end of 2008 it suggests that were will be 89 million digital television homes in Europe, nearly 60 per cent, compared to 52% or almost 60 million digital homes in the US.
Germany is expected to reach 21 million homes, a 56% penetration, while the UK will have the highest penetration at 82% with 20.6 million homes. France is expected to have 12 million (54%) and Italy 11.7 million (58%).
Datamonitor attributes the growth in Europe to the rollout of digital terrestrial television, while in the US growth will be driven by competition between cable and satellite, with high definition services as the new frontier.
In the US, operators will seek to differentiate their services with high definition television (HDTV), video on demand (VOD) and the personal video recorder (PVR). Cable operators will employ all three technologies, while satellite will be limited to HDTV and PVRs.
In Europe, VOD will be less significant due to poor cable infrastructure and PVRs are likely to become more prevalent.
The analysts consider that DSL broadband services could become a measurable competitor to traditional broadcasting, but note that the platform faces considerable challenges and high costs are likely to hinder such IPTV rollout.