Category: Applications

MUMBAI: China is preparing to launch mobile TV in time for the 2008 Olympics. Although 3G licences are yet to be distributed in China, this move that could serve as a big push for mobile television in Asia.

Media reports indicate that China will be using the digital multimedia broadcasting (DMB) standard for rollout.

A report in Xinhua quoting China‘s State Administration for Radio, Film and Television (Sarft) said that transmission of TV signals to mobiles would be tested in the middle of next year.

The satellite system will be activated in the first half of 2008 so that the Olympic Games could be projected to millions of mobile users across the country.

China‘s two biggest mobile telecom operators, China Mobile and China Unicom are expected to sign agreements at the end of the month with mobile phone makers to buy TV handsets soon.

China has more than 400 million mobile phone users and the number is increasing by 5 million a month, according to the Ministry of Information Technology.

MUMBAI: When the international consumer electronics trade show IFA opens its doors in Berlin on 1 September, 2006, visitors will experience the look and feel of the new world of television at the Siemens Communications booth.

Siemens says that with its mobile TV service via DVB-H, customers of communications companies can be more than just passive viewers of TV programs on their mobile phones. The company says that with services such as music voting, it is easy to let consumers have a say in shaping what they watch. IPTV in HDTV will mean a new era of home media use.

The living room media center is supplied with programming from the Internet via DSL and has an intuitive user interface. At IFA Siemens will be using the example of the Dutch carrier KPN to show how an IPTV interface works.

Traditional television Siemens says is entering a new era. Mobile TV and IPTV offer network operators a way to compensate for the drop in revenue stemming from falling prices for voice connections in wireless and fixed networks and to win customers with new media offerings. At IFA 2006 Siemens Communications will show how the new offerings can be structured and how the technology behind them works.

Mobile TV via the DVB-H standard enables mobile operators to offer services. They include interactive television programs that let viewers participate in votes and surveys, access to information in the Internet at a click of the mouse, interactive games for several players and real-time traffic reports that integrate navigation systems are just a few examples.

While the market for Mobile TV is still in its infancy, market researchers at Informa believe that by 2011 some 210 million people around the world will be using their portable devices as interactive TV sets and that around ten percent of all mobile handsets will have a TV receiver integrated in them.

At IFA, Siemens will show that its own mobile TV solution already runs on a wide range of common mobile phones (e.g. BenQ-Siemens, LG, Samsung), on PDAs with special SDIO cards and on state-of-the-art UMPCs from Samsung with Intel technology – perfectly and in high quality. Siemens will be showing programs from various broadcasters in Berlin, including RTL Television, nt-v and Super RTL.

Stefan Schneiders who is an expert for Mobile TV at Siemens says, “One thing is sure – carriers are very interested in tapping new revenue streams and winning their customers for trendy services that offer added value. Initial results from field trials, for example in Spain, show that Mobile TV has what it takes to fulfill the expectations of carriers and their customers.”

Siemens will be showcasing the IPTV offering of its Dutch customer KPN at IFA 2006. KPN customers in the Netherlands who have a DSL connection can receive TV from their phone socket and use numerous additional services such as a personal video recorder or TV of Yesterday. In Berlin, visitors will be able to try out KPN’s user interface, as well as getting an impression of how intuitive and simple the user guidance is from other examples, and discover that PC expertise is by no means a must.

They can also see what TV via DSL in high-definition quality using the compression standard H.264 looks like. Siemens says that it is committed to open standards for IPTV via HDTV. That also goes for the set-top boxes that are required for receiving IPTV and of which a selection will be shown in Berlin.

NEW DELHI: It has come a full circle for the Zee group. DTH service provider Tata Sky has dragged distribution company Zee Turner to court for acting pricey on giving its channels to the new entrant in the Indian DTH arena.

The case filed some days back in a Delhi court by Tata Sky states that Zee Turner is setting “unreasonable” terms for negotiations for its bouquet of channels, which amounts to a breach of various directives issued by the sector regulator.

The case is slated for a hearing today. However, court sources indicated that its unlikely arguments will take place in the first hearing.

Tata Sky, which began its commercial operations few weeks back, is presently offering consumers 55-odd TV channels at a price that is more than the Subhash Chandra-promoted Dish TV, which is country’s first pay TV platform.

Zee Turner is a 74:26 distribution joint venture between the Chandra-controlled Zee Telefilms and Time Warner company Turner International India.

The genesis of the present face-off is lack of consensus on pricing of Zee Turner channels and Tata Sky’s insistence on select TV channels from the bouquet of 32 channels.

While India’s second pay digital platform Tata Sky wants select Zee Turner channels for a reported sum of below Rs. 40 per subscriber, the latter is insisting all its 32 channels should be taken.

As reported by Indiantelevision.com earlier, sources close to the negotiations said Zee Turner has conveyed that it’s ready to give all its channels to Tata Sky’s DTH platform for Rs. 74 per subscriber per month, which is 50 per cent of the price that cable operators pay for the Zee Turner bouquet.

Bouquet 1 of Zee Turner comprises Zee TV, Zee Cinema, Zee News, Zee Studio, Zee Bengali, Zee Gujarati, Zee Marathi, Zee Punjabi, Cartoon Network, Reality TV, CNBC, CNN, Zee Café, Zee Trendz, ETC, ETC Punjabi, Zee Jagran, Zee Smile, Zee Telgu and Zee Music.

The second bouquet includes HBO, Pogo, Awaaz, VH1 and Zee Business. Zee Turner is soft bundling Zee Sports at a price benefit.

The third bouquet, called Breakfree, consists of Zee Action, Zee Premier and Zee Classic, which air movies of different genre and are primarily available on Dish TV DTH platform.

Zee Turner had earlier reasoned that its demand is based on a recent ruling of a disputes tribunal in Dish TV vs. Star case wherein Star was asked to make available its channel to Dish at Rs. 27 per subscriber, which is 50 per cent less than the price cable ops pay.

Dish TV had to wait for over 18 months since launch to finally manage to get Star channels on its DTH platform.

After having got powerful products like Star Plus, Dish TV has announced that it will not charge its consumers for some months anything extra for the Star channels, most of which are in the basic tier of 78-odd channels and can be had for Rs. 185 per month by a subscriber of Dish TV.

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MUMBAI: Hungama Mobile, a popular aggregator of Indian entertainment content and TSeries, have announced the availability of the music of Farhan Akhtar‘s eagerly-awaited Don for purchase on the iTunes Music Store (www.itunes.com).

This is the first time in the history of Bollywood that the soundtrack of a movie is being made available online on the same day as the official launch of its music, and prior to public availability of its music on CD. The soundtrack of the film will be featured on the World Page on iTunes, informs an official release.

The music was released on 26 August at an event, wherein along with Shahrukh Khan, music director of the film, Shankar, Ehsaan and Loy were also present.

Hungama Mobile MD and CEO Neeraj Roy said, “This provides a great opportunity for Bollywood, as the worldwide popularity of iTunes means we can reach out to the growing Bollywood fan base online, wherever they are. We‘re proud to have achieved a milestone by making the Don music available on iTunes.”

“We are continually working to forge strategic relationships with key digital entertainment players, such as iTunes, to extend Hungama Mobile‘s presence in online entertainment globally,” added Hungama Mobile chief operating officer Saleem Mobhani.

The film is a remake of Amitabh Bachchan starrer Don, which had hit numbers to its credit like Khaike Paan Banaras Waala, because of which expectations are high from Sharukh Khan starrer Don.

“It‘s another step forward in our endeavor to reach the Global consumer and offer them the best of Bollywood through our digital initiative which is the first from the Indian music industry,” said T-Series chairman and MD Bhushan Kumar.

“We are really excited to be working with Hungama Mobile to deliver exiting and original entertainment content and are working diligently to establish a more comprehensive distribution network in the mobile and digital space.”

Excel Entertainment producer Ritesh Sidhwani said, “We are excited to be working with Hungama Mobile to release the Music of Don for the First time on the Digital platform via the iTunes Music Store along with the audio release. We are looking forward to increasing the fan following of hindi films by reaching out to the main stream audience through iTunes and welcoming the new era of Digital consumption of content.”

The film, is slated for a diwali release.

MUMBAI: Zee TV, which is targeting an October launch of its reality talent hunt property ‘Cinestars‘, has associated with Sifymax for the on-ground auditions. The auditions will be held in 154 cities across India using the technology edge of Sify and its 3400 plus iWay cyber cafes.The channel has, meanwhile, kicked off its first phase of the auditions.

Procedure of an audition: The participant will sit in front of the web camera at the iWay cyber cafe and record his / her talent stint, further to which the same will be uploaded on Sifymax.com. Prior to performing their respective stints, guidelines in the form of tutorials will be given to the participants in the form of audio-video content.

Says Zee TV marketing head Tarun Mehra on the association, “Zee Cinestars is an all India contest and understandably the auditions requires a lot of hard work. But, with the help of Sifymax, we have simplified the whole process. The technology lessens the load and this helps us to channelise our resources to the other areas of the project.”

As per the official release, Sify iWays will act as talent hubs for aspiring participants as it will make the audition process simple and comfortable for the contestants by allowing them to come to the iWays, showcase their talent, record and upload it on www.zeecinestar.sifymax.com.

Mehra adds that, the auditions will conclude by the second week of September, after which the process of shortlisting will begin. “The shoot will begin by mid-September and we expect to launch the show by Diwali,” he says.

MUMBAI: VSNL plans to pump in US$ 200 million to build undersea telecom cable linking Singapore, Hong Kong and Japan.

The telecom major will make this investment through its Singapore arm, VSNL Singapore Pte Ltd (VSNL International).

The new intra-Asia cable will enable VSNL International to service its global customers doing business in and with the burgeoning Asia-Pacific markets, the company said in an official statement.

The investment of US $ 200 million follows the recent announcement by VSNL to build a new system from India to Europe that will provide connectivity to the Gulf region and the African continent.

The intra-Asia cable, when combined with the Tata Indicom Cable System (TIC) and the TGN-Pacific cable system (both of which are built with eight fibre pairs capable of supporting 7+ Tbil/s of traffic), will complete VSNL International‘s multi-Terabit capability from India to Asia and onward to the US.

“With Asian bandwidth demand forecasted to grow at an average of 27 per cent CAGR, VSNL International is taking steps to expand its capacity to serve customers in the booming intra-Asia market,” comments VSNL International president Vinod Kumar. “This new high-capacity cable system, soon to be one of the region‘s largest, combined with our existing C2C capacity and TGN-P capacity, will enable us to deliver high-performance bandwidth at the most cost-effective pricing and fulfil our strategy to become the market leader in bandwidth supply.”

VSNL International will commence construction of the new intra-Asia cable by December 2006. The scheduled build time for the project is 12-14 months. The Company is already in the process of finalising design details, selecting suppliers and identifying additional partners for the project. Future potential landing stations for the cables include locations in China, Taiwan, the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, and Guam.

MUMBAI: Interactive sports content for the Indian audiences! That is what DTH platform Tata Sky has up its sleeve. The service has tied up with ESPN Star Sports (ESS) to launch its Actve Sports service. The first event is the ongoing Natwest tri series between England and Pakistan.

Basically at any time in the match a viewer if he/she has missed what happened earlier can get highlights at the click of a button. They can also get statistics of the teams, players as well as ball trajectory courtesy a virtual screen. Viewers can also switch the language commentary and get expert analysis. This also applies to channels that have dubbed feeds like Discovery.

Tata Sky CEO Vikram Kaushik noted that this initiative transforms the viewer from a couch potato to an active participant. This he says is just the start of new interactive services that will be introduced soon.

Tata Sky is also looking for other sports broadcasters to jump on the bandwagon. While it has started with cricket Kaushik says that the likes of soccer, tennis give a lot of scope. In the future one could see a service where the viewer can see a four or a six being hit from different angles. Of course this requires work on the part of the broadcaster to put up extra cameras in certain locations. Also for the Natwest series Kaushik noted that there is a dedicated team of professionals doing the necessary updates as a match progresses.

Tata Sky is looking to introduce a pay per view service for films in the coming weeks. For this purpose it is talking to both Indian and Hollywood film producers. This he says is a way for producers to get additional revenue and fight piracy. As far as getting in more channels in addition to the over 50 channels already present Kaushik expressed optimism that Zee would come onboard. He is also looking to rope in Sun TV. As far as bringing in niche channels are concerned he noted that at the moment exclusivity in DTH is not allowed. He hopes that partial exclusivity will allowed in the future so that someone who is interested in niche content like gardening or cooking can watch that kind of content on DTH even if it is not present on cable.

When asked about targets he said that he would be disappointed if Tata Sky did not reach the one million subscriber mark in the first year of operation. In terms of breakeven the company is looking at a four to five year time frame. Right now the introductory price is Rs. 200 a month in addition to the Rs. 3999 for the dish and installation. In a few months time subscribers can choose from packages.

MUMBAI: Viacom‘s MTV Networks has selected parenting site BabyNames.com for their new pilot program to distribute their video content online.

BabyNames.com and other targeted sites will be hosting clips from MTV, VH1, Logo, Nickelodeon, and Comedy Central — free of charge to their visitors. The videos will be distributed through the Google Adsense program, informs an official release.

BabyNames.com founder Jennifer Moss said, “We‘re thrilled to be a part of the program. We have a great relationship with Google and are pleased to expand our content offering through this new service.”

Online since 1996, BabyNames.com now receives over 1.2 million unique visitors a month. Other features of the site include name popularity lists, pregnancy planning, parenting advice and an active message board community, adds the release.

MUMBAI: Consumer electronics major Sony has announced a new product named – Vaio LS1 TV/PC combo. The company says that the product combines the power of a PC with the LCD quality and stylish design.

Featuring a framed display with a transparent border for a floating effect, the LS1 model packs the essentials for powerful computing into a slim chassis discreetly hidden behind the back of a flat-panel 19-inch WSXGA+ (1680 x 1050) LCD display.

The new Vaio LS1 TV/PC model incorporates an Intel Core Duo processor, 2GB of RAM and a 250 GB hard drive for running multiple, demanding applications simultaneously. For instance, the customer can watch and/or record a TV show while downloading music in the background. The unit is a Windows Vista capable PC. It is also Windows Vista Premium ready.

Sporting a 19-inch widescreen display powered by Sony’s XBRITE-HiColour technology, the unit doubles as a flat-panel TV.

The LS1 model ships with Microsoft Windows XP MCE 2005 and a built-in NTSC TV tuner providing DVR-like recording capabilities. It also has a built-in DVD burner and Sony’s Click to DVD software so that the consumer can create a digital entertainment library for personal viewing at your convenience.

The new Vaio TV/PC also features an audio/video quick resume switch that shuts down the display and the audio output without the PC having to enter sleep mode. This allows the user to return to full PC functionality without waiting for the computer to shut down or boot up.

MUMBAI: Qualcomm Incorporated, a leading developer and innovator of Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) and other advanced wireless technologies, has introduced the QSC1100 single-chip solution.

The QSC1100 solution doubles talk time compared to currently available CDMA2000 handsets, in addition to supporting features such as downloadable polyphonic ringtones and color displays.

The QSC1100 is designed to enable CDMA2000 handsets that break new industry price barriers for emerging markets worldwide, according to an official release.

Addressing the dramatic subscriber growth anticipated in emerging markets around the world, the QSC1100 solution features multiple technologies to dramatically improve network capacity by up to 100 percent.

“The QSC1100 enables our handset manufacturing partners to further extend their offerings in emerging markets by introducing compelling, attractive devices at new price points,” said Qualcomm CDMA Technologies president Dr. Sanjay K Jha. “Working with all levels of the wireless ecosystem, Qualcomm is able to meet a common goal of accelerating time to market for a wide variety of new handsets with differentiated features and superior user experiences.”

The release adds that the QSC1100 solution’s integration of baseband modem, RF transceiver, power management and system memory into a single chip reduces the number of discrete components required, reduces bill-of-materials costs and delivers board-area savings of more than 50 percent. Manufacturers can now offer smaller and sleeker designs at significantly lower price points and benefit from reduced development time for quicker time to market. The QSC1100 solution offers a wide range of features to deliver a superior user experience, including:

· Voice/SMS and support for downloadable polyphonic ringtones and wallpapers

· Up to twice the talk time of CDMA2000 handsets in the market today

· 65nm process technology for enhanced performance and cost effectiveness

· Multiple frequency operation, including 450MHz, 800MHz, 1900MHz and 2100MHz

· Multiple technologies that allow network operators to prioritize voice capacity or improve network capacity by up to 60 percent, or double the capacity within the same spectrum with the additional implementation of four-way receive diversity at the base station:

– Fourth Generation Vocoder: a core voice codec suite giving network operators the flexibility to prioritize voice quality or network capacity

– Qualcomm Linear Interference Cancellation: including pilot and traffic interference cancellation

· Support for color displays and speakerphone

The QSC1100 solution is expected to sample by the second half of 2007. For more information about Qualcomm ’s’ single-chip products, visit www.cdmatech.com/singlechip.