A roundup of vendor and operator news from around the globe. Today's edition focuses on Asia-Pacific and Europe.
Hong Kong
A CASBAA survey indicates that 24% of Hong Kong consumers use a TV box that can be used to stream pirated TV and video content. The boxes, also known as illicit streaming devices (ISDs), allow users to access hundreds of thousands of pirated TV channels and VOD content, usually with the payment of a one-time fee. TV boxes BossTV (9%), Ubox (7%), EVPad (6%), Lingcod (5%), and Magic Box (4%), which come pre-loaded with applications allowing plug-and-play access to pirated content, are among the most popular ISDs among Hong Kong consumers. More than 350 ISDs were recently seized in a Hong Kong Customs enforcement operation (Operation Trojan Horse), resulting in the arrest of four shop owners and four salespersons, all of whom were subsequently charged with copyright offences.
The survey, commissioned by CASBAA's Coalition Against Piracy (CAP) and conducted by YouGov, also highlighted the effects of streaming piracy on legitimate online subscription services. Of the 24% of consumers who purchased an ISD, 49% claimed that they had cancelled all or some of their subscriptions to legal pay TV services. Some 26% claimed that they cancelled their subscription to local pay TV services as a direct consequence of owning an ISD. Some 19% stated that they had cancelled a specific part of their traditional cable TV bundle or packages after purchasing an ISD. International subscription services were also not immune to the prevalent usage of ISDs in Hong Kong - 21% of users who had purchased an ISD said that they had cancelled their international subscription service that was available to them in Hong Kong.
India
Indian video operator Tata Sky has selected ThinkAnalytics to provide personalized content recommendations across connected devices. The personalized recommendations will initially be available on Tata Sky's applications across mobile and PC platforms.
Tata Sky, which has more than 18 million connections, is using the ThinkAnalytics Recommendations content discovery platform for live and on-demand content combined with ThinkMovies and ThinkTV semantic micro genre metadata to improve the level of personalization of the content recommendations.
Hungary
Magyar Telekom, a telecommunications operator in Hungary, has deployed Harmonic's (NASDAQ:HLIT) EyeQ content-aware encoding solution for its IP video service. The deployment is intended to enable the operator is able to deliver additional HD channels and realize a 30% bandwidth saving on the aggregated constant bit rate (CBR) core network, without investing in additional network infrastructure.
Magyar Telekom also employed statistical multiplexing technology from Harmonic, which aggregates the variable bit rate (VBR) encoded channels into a CBR core network to optimize its bandwidth.