By Michael Eagles, UPC Broadband and Tim Burke, Liberty Global Inc.
The growth of mobile user terminals suitable for multi-media consumption, combined with emerging mobile multi-media applications and the increasing capacities of wireless technology, provide a case for understanding facilities-based mobile broadcast, multicast and unicast technologies as a complement to fixed line broadcast video. In developing a view of mobile TV as a compliment to cable broadcast video; this paper considers the drivers for future facilities-based mobile TV technology, alternative mobile TV distribution platforms, and, compares the economics for the delivery of mobile TV services. We develop a taxonomy to compare the alternatives, and explore broadcast technologies such as DVB-H, DVH-SH and MediaFLO, multicast technologies such as out-of-band and in-band MBMS, and unicast or streaming platforms.