The rules of the game in India’s booming IPTV, DTH and telecom space are set to change, if Anil Ambani-led Reliance Communications (RCom) has its way.
Inks $500 m deal with Microsoft for IPTV; readies for DTH rollout
MUMBAI: The rules of the game in India’s booming IPTV, DTH and telecom space are set to change, if Anil Ambani-led Reliance Communications (RCom) has its way.
The company plans to straddle IPTV and DTH platforms simultaneously, as it is doing with CDMA and GSM at present.
Under a strategic partnership announced by RCom and Microsoft on Monday, for providing Internet Protocol Television (IPTV) services, RCom will invest $500 million as licence fee for the software and spend an additional $500 million in setting up IPTV infrastructure in the country.
Reliance ADA Group chairman Anil Ambani said, “We will provide IPTV through our own platform and are targeting 400 channels to start with in Mumbai and Delhi.”
RCom has been carrying out IPTV trials in around 20,000 households in Mumbai and Delhi and would be ready to launch services by the fiscal-end, to start with in Mumbai and Delhi, with 400 channels.
The company will also start offering its Bluemagic direct-to-home (DTH) television service in the next few months.
Steve Ballmer, CEO, Microsoft said, “Reliance is about to change the way consumers experience TV. It is the only major digital device that has been left out of the networking revolution and Microsoft and Reliance are now making the TV a first class citizen in the connected enterprise landscape.”
Prakash Bajpai, RCom’s president-home and enterprise business said the technology gives viewers complete control on home entertainment as well as internet-enabled
information and communication services on an ‘always on’ basis.
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