Skip to main content

Pay-TV Market Transition Impacts Set-Top Box Needs

The volatile pay-TV industry is going through a period of transition, as low-cost video entertainment services gain new subscribers -- and thereby further fragment the global markets. As a result, traditional pay-TV service providers are evolving their offerings, which directly impacts their systems and CPE device suppliers.

Infonetics Research released excerpts from its first quarter 2011 (1Q11) Cable, Satellite, IPTV, and Over-the-Top (OTT) Set-Top Boxes and subscribers market share and forecast report.

"Despite a quarter-over-quarter decline in the global set-top box market, all major segments are up from this time a year ago in both revenue and shipments, indicating that the pay-TV market is rebounding after two years of significant declines," said Teresa Mastrangelo, directing analyst for video at Infonetics Research.

In 1Q11, evidence continued to mount that pay-TV service providers are in the early stages of implementing hybrid IP networks that offer both OTT and traditional on-demand services -- combined with linear broadcast TV channels.

As such, the hybrid segment of the market will experience the strongest growth over the next few years.

Infonetics' latest market study highlights include:

- The global set-top box market declined 10.2 percent in 1Q11 to $3.1 billion, primarily attributed to normal seasonal trends.

- The cable STB segment continues to contract as subscriber growth remains limited across the lucrative North America and EMEA markets and demand slows for advanced services.

- The cable STB segment experienced the strongest sequential revenue declines, down 12.9 percent in 1Q11.

- Lower than expected demand for IPTV services in EMEA during 1Q11 resulted in strong declines in shipments into this region, causing an 11.7 percent drop in global IP STB revenue.

- Demand for OTT media services remained strong in 1Q11, but challenges lie ahead for this category.

- During 1Q11, hybrid STBs represented 8 percent of revenue and 7 percent of shipments; Netgem leads in hybrid IP/OTA STBs, Motorola leads in hybrid IP/QAM STBs, and ADB leads in hybrid IP/DVB-S STBs.

- Motorola and Pace continue to battle it out for overall STB market leadership, with Motorola leading in revenue and Pace leading in unit shipments.

- Cisco is the market share leader in both revenue and shipments in the IP STB market.

- Echostar leads in worldwide satellite STB revenue, in a tight race with Technicolor.

Popular posts from this blog

Ultra-Wideband in Billions of New Devices

 Ultra-Wideband (UWB) is quietly becoming one of the most strategic short-range wireless technologies in the market, moving from niche deployments into the mainstream of smartphones, cars, and smart spaces. As the ecosystem matures and next-generation implementations arrive, UWB is shifting from nice-to-have to a foundational capability for secure access, sensing, and high-performance device-to-device connectivity. UWB Technology Market Development Unlike Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, NFC, or legacy IEEE 802.15.4 implementations, UWB combines three powerful attributes in a single radio: secure ranging, radar-like sensing, and low-latency, high-throughput short-range data. This allows networking and IT vendors to architect experiences that blend precise location, context awareness, and rich interaction in ways traditional connectivity stacks cannot easily match. According to the latest worldwide market study by ABI Research, UWB is expected to be one of the fastest-growing wireless connectivity...