A comprehensive study of the emerging mobile TV business comes from Strategy Analytics, an independent global research and consulting firm with headquarters in Boston. The study predicts that mobile TV phone sales revenue worldwide will soar from $5 billion in 2006 to more than $30 billion by 2010. The company notes that Japan and Korea now account for more than 80 percent of TV phones sold, however, it expects Western Europe and North America, as well as China, will be the hot spots for global volume growth during the next few years.

Another study, conducted by San Francisco-based Telephia Inc., found that mobile TV and video usage, although growing slowly, is attracting a higher proportion of the young adult, male demographic. Telephia states that only 1.5 percent of the U.S. subscriber base, or roughly three million wireless subscribers, streamed TV or played video content on their phone in the fourth quarter of 2005.

Mobile subscribers ages 18-24, Telephia reports, have the highest percentage of mobile TV and video usage, securing a 3.3 percent rate, doubling since the beginning of 2005. Overall, men are more likely to stream TV and play video content on their wireless devices than women, showing a penetration rate of 1.8 percent or more than 3.5 million wireless subscribers during the fourth quarter of 2005. Female mobile subscribers who accessed mobile TV and video content over their handsets had a rate of 1.2 percent in Q4 2005, equaling 2.5 million consumers, according to Telephia.

MobiTV Inc. the first company to offer TV content for mobile phone handsets, recently announced that more than one million users now subscribe to its mobile television services worldwide. MobiTV takes the original broadcast signal, compresses the digital video, formats it to fit the small screens of mobile handsets and sends the digitally encoded video frames in IP packets directly to the user’s handset via the mobile's carrier network. MobiTV is in the process of expanding its service to Wi-Fi devices and networks. At the 2006 International CES, the company announced the official launch of Wi-Fi enabled MobiTV Service for the Palm T|X handheld as well as the Palm Treo 600 series.

As executed on the Palm Treo 650 smart phone, users have a simple, TV-like interface that includes a graphical channel guide and support for channel navigation and volume control using the familiar five-way native Palm navigation and touch-screen capabilities.

Taking advantage of the bandwidth available through most Wi-Fi networks, MobiTV can deliver broadcast quality television at 24 frames per second and offers more than a dozen channels, including ABC News Now, Bloomberg, C-SPAN, Comedy Time, ESPN, Fox News, Fox Sports and The Weather Channel.

For heavy duty service streaming in a wide area to a large audience, MediaFlo and DVB-H (Digital Video Broadcast—Handheld) are considered more suitable because they promise to deliver live and on-demand television to handheld terminals without reducing cellular network capacity for voice and data traffic. These non-cellular technologies promise frame rates of 25 frames per second compared to 15 frames per second or less on current cellular networks. 

DVB-H is largely based on the DVB-T specification for digital terrestrial television broadcasting, adding to it a number of features designed to take account of the limited battery life of small handheld devices and the particular environments in which such receivers must operate. Operating on the 1.6-GHz band, DVB-H uses a technique called time-slicing, where bursts of data are received periodically, allowing the receiver to power off when it is inactive, leading to significant battery power savings. The DVB-H standard also benefits operators by preserving cellular network bandwidth for voice and other data services.

Modeo LLC, a subsidiary of Crown Castle International Corp., plans to deliver live TV channels, audio channels and podcasting content over its planned DVB-H network to a variety of mobile devices in the top 30 markets in the U.S.  A Modeo DVB-H integrated smart phone is expected to be available during the second half of 2006.

Strategic Analytics expects DVB-H will account for 19 percent of TV phones sold in 2006, rising to 40 percent by 2010 as a result of strong support from players such as Nokia, Motorola, Siemens and Sony Ericsson. There are more than ten DVB-H network trials that either have concluded or currently are underway around the globe, including Australia, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom and the U.S.

MediaFLO, a wholly owned subsidiary of Qualcomm, plans to offer interactive wireless video and audio programming to 3G mobile phones in cooperation with U.S. wireless operators. The companies are working with Verizon Wireless to launch real-time mobile TV services in approximately half of the markets already covered by Verizon’s EV-DO-based broadband network. Based on Qualcomm’s FLO technology, the network will deliver multimedia content in the 700-MHz spectrum. The MediaFLO system is said to complement existing networks and deliver expanded multimedia without impacting voice and data communications. MediaFLO trials will begin this summer.

In a related development MediaFLO and Network LIVE, a joint venture between AOL, XM Satellite Radio and AEG, have signed a multi-year commercial agreement to provide Network LIVE content and programming for MediaFLO USA's wireless multimedia service offering. 

As telecom companies enter the market for TV services, they may be facing a somewhat skeptical customer base. In-Stat reports that only five percent of satellite or cable TV subscribers responding to a consumer survey said they definitely would switch to a telco TV provider. The high-tech market research firm also says another 13 percent indicated they probably would switch, but 52 percent were undecided. Many consumer decisions to switch to a telco TV provider will depend on the services and the cost savings offered.