Triple/Quadruple Play

DT cuts its triple-play price again

Tom Burton — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 07:59:30 -0400

Deutsche Telecom has again cut its triple-play subscription rate as it seeks to reach its target of 500,000 IPTV subscribers by year's end. DT re-branded the service to Entertain IPTV mid-last year and cut the subscription price by 25 percent to try and kick start demand. The German pay-TV market is notoriously price sensitive.

Late January it surprised the market when it announced an aggressive target of 500,000 IPTV subscribers by the end of the year, a 350,000 growth over the year. Then at CeBIT in Hanover, the big telco surprised the market again with another 17 percent price cut to bring the basic package down to below the 50 euro ($76) a month mark to 49.95 euros ($75.92) a month. The basic triple play price is now only 10 euros ($15.20) per month more than than the double play--internet and voice--price. In France the triple play entry price is now down at just under 30 euros ($45.60) a month, which has seen many subscribers up-size their internet and telephone offering to include IPTV for only a marginal price increase.

For more:
- DT lowers IPTV price Article

Related articles:
Could DT be a buyer of Sprint Article
T-Mobile offers $10 a month VoIP Article

Comcast fails to sway Wall Street

Tom Burton — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 06:59:40 -0500

Comcast continues to struggle to persuade investors its triple-play strategy is winning. Its share price is down 35 percent over the year, making it the seventh-worst performing stock on the NASDAQ 100 index. Despite a 54 percent increase in Q4 income and a dividend payment, CEO Brian Roberts is under pressure from major shareholder Chieftain Capital Management Inc., which last month called for his ouster. The offer of a dividend did spur a small rally last week with prices up 95 cents to $20.19 at market close Friday.

Roberts has overseen an aggressive $6 billion investment to equip Comcast to provide triple-pay services across its cable footprint of 40 million homes. Comcast has been the most successful non-telco in signing up customers to its digital voice and high-speed Internet offerings. It is now the fourth-largest supplier of residential telephony in the U.S. Both Verizon and AT&T's U-verse service are aggressively ramping up their IPTV roll outs, and both are expected to impact Comcast's subscriber growth in its traditional markets as well as cap its pricing.

Roberts said Comcast expects revenue to increase 8 percent to 10 percent this year, and its capital expenditures as a percentage of revenue to decline to 18 percent in 2008. Comcast is also under tight scrutiny by the FCC, where chair Kevin Martin has singled Comcast out for special attention. He claims Comcast is too dominant as evidenced by the 10 percent average yearly pricing increases over the last decade.

For more:
- Comcast Q4 income up 54 percent Article
- Comcast investors seek buyback, payout as shares drop Article

Related articles:
Comcast raises profit, declares dividend Report
Comcast defends P2P management Report

TiVo and cable team up

Tue, 27 Nov 2007 06:59:30 -0500

Switched video remains cable TV's principle weapon against telco and satellite incursions and for many is the reason why IPTV will struggle to make inroads in the U.S. market. Hence, why everyone should take note of the alliance this week between TiVo and the cable lobby the National Cable and Telecommunications Association.

Tivo of course is the brand behind the box which records TV to a hard drive and then replays it--sans ads if you like. The announcement was for an adapter that enables TiVo's CableCARD-enabled DVRs to view switched digital channels--no extra set top box required.

"We are gratified that the cable industry has agreed to work quickly to develop a solution that will enable existing TiVo CableCARD DVRs to directly access switched digital cable channels and ensure the adapter is part of an easy installation process for cable subscribers," said TiVo CEO Tom Rogers. Cable operators will make the new adapters available for TiVo customers in the second quarter of 2008. Cable operators and TiVo will work cooperatively to alert TiVo customers about availability of the new adapter.

Switched digital enables cable operators to transmit channels to customers on an as-needed basis, and provides flexibility to deliver interactive digital services, HDTV, broadband Internet and digital phone services down one pipe.

Which is what IPTV is also promising.

More Reports:
- TiVo and NCTA alliance Release
- NBC to use TiVo's TV Viewership Data Wall Street Journal Story

Related articles:
- Analyst: IPTV will kill TiVo Report
- BigBand demos IPTV delivery technology for cable Report

Italy gets third IPTV player

Tue, 20 Nov 2007 06:59:10 -0500

Italian telco Wind is launching a new IPTV service next month, joining established IPTV service provider Fastweb and Telecom Italia's new Alice Home TV service on the market. Prices for the new service are expected to be set at a discount as part of Winds strategy to grow market share and is likely to be bundled as a triple play offering telephony and high speed internet. Wind's Director General, Fabrizio Bona, earlier this year said Wind would not be a content producer but only a distributor.

Wind's new IPTV service will launch with all of the Sky Italia channels, and is promising more channels later. Alcatel was selected by Wind Telecommunications, to deploy a turnkey, end-to-end triple play solution. The project has been valued at valued at approximately 80 million euros. Subscribers will be offered a Motorola set-top box model, to be distributed exclusively in Italy, which includes a 160GB hard drive.

More Reports:
- Wind was going to launch its service earlier this year Story

Related articles:
- Content acquisition a problem for Europe IPTV Report
- Revenue vs. deployment Report

Verizon puts the heat on Cable

Tue, 30 Oct 2007 07:59:50 -0400

Verizon's latest results reveal it has added another 202,000 FiOS TV customers, giving it a total of 707,000 customers using its multi-channel service. That's 3,200 new units each working day. Combined with its bundled Direct TV customers Verizon now has 1.5 million video customers and with penetration running at over 15 percent in markets Verizon operates in, it is no wonder Comcast and others are chasing telephony and data revenues.

On the internet side Verizon added 202,000 FiOS customers and another 56,000 DSL customers leaving it with 8 million broadband internet customers, up 23 percent for the year as subscribers continue to switch off their basic dial up services. The growth in both broadband and video contributed to a 67 percent increase in broadband and video revenue year on year, compared with 55 percent for the previous year. The results are impressive--especially in a slowing economy--but the big question is whether all the effort of rolling out fiber and bundling TV, Internet, and telephony (wired and wireless), is stemming the landline turn off rate?

According to Verizon CFO, Doreen Toben, big picture the total number of bundled retail customers was up 1.4 million to 7.4 million for the year, despite another 664,000 customers turning off their land line in Q3 alone. In Rhode Island--where FiOS is well established--she said Verizon had actually experienced line growth.

At the same time, the big growth in internet usage is coming primarily from FiOS, with Verizon President Denny Strigl admitting to analysts it was the lightning speed of fiber that was prompting cable customers to make the switch. He also predicted FiOS would go EBITDA positive next year. It is early to make the call, but with consumer ARPU up a healthy 10.8 per cent for the year, it does seem Verizon has found the solution to the most fundamental challenge facing the telco industry.

For More:
- Verizon Q3 results Summary
- Verizon Earnings Conference call Investor Webcast
- Quick takeaways Report
- Tax charges hurt Verizon's results (AP) Report

Related Articles:
Telecom earnings run the gauntlet Opinion
Earnings: AT&T up; Level 3 suffers Report

Verizon FiOS TV now has 500K subscribers

Tue, 26 Jun 2007 06:59:50 -0400

Verizon celebrated the 1 millionth subscriber to its FiOS Internet service last week as well as the 500,000th subscriber to its FiOS TV service. The half-million subscriber mark comes only 20 months after Verizon launched the fiber-based TV service in September 2005. Verizon said that both milestones were achieved during the second quarter of this year.

The 1 millionth subscriber to FiOS Internet, Marjorie Bayer of Massapequa, NY, also has FiOS TV: "You can really see the difference in picture quality from what we had before, on regular channels and especially on high-def," Bayer said. "What we really like is the multi-room DVR, because the kids like to watch shows in their rooms that we've recorded downstairs. Overall, when we came back to Verizon we lost nothing and gained a lot."

For more on the milestone:
- read this article from TVover.net

AT&T mobile videoshare, mentions IPTV tie-in

Tue, 26 Jun 2007 06:59:40 -0400

Last week at NXTcomm, AT&T announced the launch of AT&T Video Share, a new service enabling users to share live video over mobile devices while participating in voice calls. According to AT&T, Video Share enables one-way, live streaming video feeds, viewable by both participants in a two-way voice conversation; while touting the service as a means for subscribers to share video from events like weddings and related celebrations, the operator also outlined a series of potential enterprise applications like viewing real estate and facilitating insurance claims.

The first service delivered via AT&T's next-gen IMS network platform, Video Share is now available in Atlanta, Dallas and San Antonio--in late July, the service will expand across the carrier's 3G footprint. AT&T will offer Video Share at prices of $4.99 per month for 25 minutes of usage or $9.99 per month for an hour of usage. Subscribers may also select a pay-as-you-go option at 35 cents per minute.

"Video Share is groundbreaking today as a wireless-to-wireless service, but the potential for the service will expand even further in the near future," said AT&T chairman and CEO Randall Stephenson during his NXTcomm keynote. "Imagine watching television when a notice pops on the screen that a daughter or granddaughter would like to initiate a Video Share call, then immediately switching the television screen to accept the video and audio. With our powerful IP-based network and flexible IMS platform, these scenarios will eventually be reality."

Stephenson also noted that the service would make it's way to the PC screen and television screen very soon. Mobile-to-U-Verse live video feeds? Maybe soon enough.

For more on Video Share:
- read this release

Verizon FiOS TV tops 200K subscribers

Wed, 31 Jan 2007 19:01:30 -0500

Verizon's FiOS TV reported 207,000 total subscribers at the end of 2006, which makes for a 75 percent quarterly hike in subscribers during its Q4. FiOS TV is available to 2.4 million homes, giving Verizon a 9 percent penetration rate in the markets it serves with TV, including 200 cities in parts of 10 states. As for cable-TV franchises, Verizon secured about 600 franchises that cover more than 7 million households. Verizon's FTTH rollouts have passed more than 6 million premises by the end of 2006 and the company hopes to pass 18 million homes by the end of 2010.

For more on Verizon's FiOS TV metrics:
- see this company press release

ALSO: Verizon debuts quadruple play service. Article

Verizon FiOS cranks up to 50 Mpbs

Wed, 10 Jan 2007 19:01:00 -0500

Cablevision and other local cable providers have taken Verizon to task, and now the telco is ramping up its connection speeds for its FiOS service to 50 Mbps downstream and 5 Mbps upstream. Previously, the high end of FiOS saw speeds of 30 Mbps down and 5 Mbps upstream. The medium tier has been increased to 15 Mbps downstream and 2 Mbps up. While the 30 Mbps service cost $179 a month, rumor has it that the increased service will cost less at $90 a month. Despite the dramatic decrease in price, competitors like Cablevision would still have it beat, since their comparable service runs for a third of the price.

For more on Verizon's FiOS service:
- see this article from GigaOM

AT&T: No regrets for not rolling out FTTH

Wed, 06 Dec 2006 19:01:30 -0500

Unlike its rival Verizon, AT&T chose to deploy fiber-to-the-node (FTTN), instead of the more costly fiber-to-the-home (FTTH), and during a recent conference AT&T CTO Richard Lindner defended the company's decision: "Our view at this point is that we're not going to have [to run] fiber to the home... We're pleased with the bandwidth that we're seeing over copper." Analysts estimate the cost of FTTH per actual customer acquired is about $9,650. While a home may be passed with FTTH, the owner is not necessarily going to subscribe to the service. The bottomline squares, but will the network scale?

Verizon FiOS subscribers get speeds of 30Mbps/5Mbps for $179.95 per month and 15Mbps/2Mbps for $44.95 per month, while AT&T's service tops 6Mbps down and a 1Mbps up. How long will those numbers suffice for AT&T? Three, four or five years?

For more on AT&T's FTTN strategy:
- see this post over at Arstechnica