Industries
Brits Get Taste of Mobile TV
British carrier O2 will deliver the BBC and other TV channels to cell phones for 400 U.K. viewers in a trial starting next week.
Hundreds of Brits will be able to watch U.K. television channels including the BBC on their cell phones next week, in a trial launched by U.K. carrier O2 and tech company Arqiva, the companies said Thursday.
O2 said the 400-person trial is a U.K. first and will include 16 channels, including BBC One, BBC Two, News 24, and ITV 1, among others. Even East Enders, the 20-year-old British soap that’s gained a cult-like following, can be watched wirelessly during the trial.
While cell phone companies have been pushing mobile video over the past year, and claiming mobile TV is ready for broadcast, the transmission of real TV channels to cell phones has been slower in coming.
There have been a lot of hurdles keeping mobile TV from going mainstream. Among them: Some networks aren’t equipped to handle the high-data stream; handset screens often distort mobile viewing; and content companies are unsure how to work with mobile (see I Don’t Want My Mobile TV, Yet).
Mobile TV Future
But starting next week, O2 customers will get a glimpse of what a mobile TV future could look like. The British research firm Informa Telecoms and Media predicts that 124 million viewers will own TV broadcast-enabled cell phones by 2010.
O2 said customers will be able to select a program from an on-screen guide, search for live shows, or set up alerts for when a show is about to start.
“By establishing relationships through activities such as this, we hope that potential challenges will be minimized and mobile TV becomes a commercial reality sooner than is currently possible,” said O2 Chief Technology Officer Dave Williams in a statement.
The service is based on a transmission technology called DVB-H (digital video broadcasting–handheld). DVB-H uses a combination of Internet and broadcasting, according to Informa Telecoms and Research.
In South Korea , cell phone companies already run television channels over cellular and are implementing an alternative digital broadcasting system called DMB, or digital mobile broadcast.
Nokia 7710 smartphone, pictured here.


Mobile phone provider O2 (O2) in partnership with Nokia and Arqiva began a trial of a new service that allows customers to watch broadcast TV on their mobile phone. The trial began on Thursday in Oxford. Four hundred O2 customers have been selected to participate. According to O2  the trial represents a balanced selection of the population. 

Participants have been supplied with Nokia 7710 smartphones, that can receive 16 channels. The trial service currently carries BBC ONE, BBC TWO, BBC News 24, ITV 1, ITV 2, Channel 4 and 5, Eurosport, Cartoon Network, CNN, Discovery Channel, MTV, ShortsTV, Sky News, Sky Sports News and Sky Travel.

TV shows are transmitted using a technology called Digital Video Broadcasting for Handhelds (DVB-H). It requires a special receiver to be connected to the mobile phone. Nokia has said they plan to build support for the DVB-H technology into future Nokia phones. Using DVB-H the phones will get about eight hours per charge, this is because the DVB-H uses the "time slicing" technology.

Many other UK providers have offered mobile TV on cellphones, however this is the first to offer regular full length TV shows. Most other providers use the 3G video-streaming technology. "3G is perfect for two-minute video clips. But, if you're watching a 90-minute football game, we think DVB-H is the most suitable,"  said Dave Williams, O2's chief technical officer

Customers can use an onscreen programme to select programmes they wish to watch and it will alert them when the show starts.

In South Korea many mobile phone companies already offer television on mobile phones using a system called digital mobile broadcast.  In the US a recent survey by InStat, found few Americans are interested in mobile TV.  Canadian company Telus also recently began to offer mobile TV services.

"By establishing relationships through activities such as this, we hope that potential challenges will be minimized and mobile TV becomes a commercial reality sooner than is currently possible," said Dave Williams, O2's chief technical officer