Will you pay for DoC's Digital TV shambles?
The Department of Communication suprised industry recently by announcing that they were reconsidering the standard for digital terrestrial television (DTT) in South Africa. According to M-Net CEO, Patricia Scholtemeyer, this comes after ” the standard was approved by Cabinet, implemented in policy and confirmed in regulation.”
In a combined press briefing held yesterday, M-Net and e.tv outlined why they believe changing South Africa’s DTT standard to Integrated Services Digital Broadcasting – Terrestrial (ISDB-T) will end up costing the end user.
Karen Willenberg, M-Net’s Director of Regulatory and Legal Affairs, presented the process that led to Digital Video Broadcasting – Terrestrial (DVB-T) being chosen as the South African DTT standard, as well as providing counter-arguments to the claims being made about DVB-T.
Willenberg said that the Digital Broadcasting Advisory Body (DBAB), which was appointed by the Minister in 2002, rejected ISDB because of a number of factors. Among them were that it only operates in 6MHz environments, whereas South Africa uses 8MHz, and the cost of set top boxes (STBs) was too high.
She went on to mention that the Digital Migration Working Group investigated the available standards (ATSC, ISDB, DVB) again in 2006 and found DVB to be the most suitable.
Lara Kantor, Group Executive for Regulatory Strategy at e.tv said that R250 million had already been invested in DVB-T and that ISDB-T set top boxes cost about double that of DVB-T STBs.
Dave Hagen, Technical Director of DTT at M-Net added that there is no ISDB equipment that currently works at 8Mhz either. This means that ISDB-T STBs would have to be developed specifically for South Africa.
Hagen priced ISDB-T STBs that run on 6MHz networks between $150 and $180 (US) at retail, whereas DVB-T STBs retails for about $90. Due to the higher set top box price, he stated that an additional subsidy from government to the tune of R2.2 billion would be required.
Representatives from the two companies also highlighted that in addition to STBs, no ISDB-T transmission equipment exists that operates at 8MHz. They indicated that it would also have to be developed specially for South Africa if the switch to ISDB is made.
Outside of the monetary cost, much was said about the cost in time a change in standards at this late stage would cause.
“If everything were resolved tomorrow we’d be able to launch in 9 months or so,” Kantor said.
According to Kantor, going through the relevant processes (including ITU, SABS and ICASA processes) as well as local STB development would delay DTT in South Africa by another 3-5 years. This is in addition to the delays caused by the current review of the specifications called for by the Department of Communications.
Cabinet had originally set a 1 November 2011 deadline for switching off analogue television transmissions. The International Telecommunications Union said that the transition from analogue to digital broadcasting should end on 17 June 2015.
“A switch to ISDB will not only jeopardise the 2011 deadline,” said Willenberg. “It will also jeopardise the 2015 deadline laid down by the ITU.”
Switching to ISDB-T: Short-term pain for long-term gain, or waste of resources? << Discuss in the forums
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