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Mobile TV launches test transmission in Johannesburg
| Jan Vermeulen | December 3, 2010 | No comments |
Jan Vermeulen
Jan Vermeulen is a technology journalist and web developer at MyBroadband. After receiving a Computer Engineering degree at the University of Pretoria he worked at...
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A test broadcast using the Korean Digital Multimedia Broadcasting standard has been launched in South Africa
Mobile TV announced today that it has achieved its first milestone on Wednesday afternoon with live test transmissions of the Korean Digital Multimedia Broadcasting (DMB) technology from Sentech’s Brixton Towers’ site in Johannesburg.
ICASA awarded Mobile TV, formerly known as Mobile TV Consortium, a 12 month trial broadcasting license for DMB in September.
In a press statement Mobile TV announced that they’ve launched test broadcasts of SABC1 and SABC2 as well as the radio stations 5FM and Metro FM.
“This is a historic event and strategic partnership, grounded in sustainable public-private initiative,” said Mobile TV’s chairman, Mothobi Mutloatse. Mutloatse said that the technical team comprises of people from Sweden, Austriala, South Korea and South Africa.
“SABC is the first broadcaster to be granted the honour of testing not just digital multimedia broadcasting in South Africa on mobile devices, but equally interactivity [sic],” said Mutloatse.
“This means then that both SABC radio channels (5FM and MetroFM) became the first audio stations to go digital in South Africa. Soon, [either 5FM or Metro FM] would also become the first audio station in Africa to test DMB’s Visual Radio interactivity, which allows for music downloads and internet services,” Mutloatse said.
According to Mobile TV’s press statement, CEO of Factum Electronics in Sweden Patrik Olsson said: “We are pleased to be part of such a ground-breaking project.”
Mutloatse said that the national public broadcaster has been identified as a strategic component of MobileTV’s offering. “This is for the simple reason that the SABC is the broadest and most diverse media house in the country.”
All of this would have remained a pipedream had Sentech not pulled all the engineering stops to rise to the occasion, said Mutloatse.
“At one stage we had a 24-person squad comprising Sentech, SABC, OntimeTek from Seoul, Haris Austria, Hi-Tech-audio, Concillium Technologies, NIC and MobileTV working around the clock to switch-on,” he added.
Mutloatse said a more comprehensive statement by the three partners would be released at the official launch of the test trials to be held at the SABC next week.
Trial DMB broadcasts << Would you choose Mobile TV or DStv mobile?
