Thursday 15 May 2008

MBMS - R.I.P.

Even though slow progress on MBMS (Multimedia Broadcast Multicast Service) has been going on for some time, just found out through sources that the two biggest promoters of this technology have put it on backburner. The reason they cite is the lack of interest from operators. They do not have a burning need for Mobile TV technologies as they are still able to cope with the demand by streaming point to point connections.

Somebody told me on condition of anonymity that the big operators in UK are at a breaking point but the things are still surviving because in the peak hours (9am to 5pm) there is not much demand for Mobile TV and the voice occupies the complete bandwidth. Whereas after 7pm and before 7am there is an even distribution of data and voice services. In the buffer zone (7am to 9am and 5pm to 7pm) data is being given low priority and many data calls dont work. This would cause decent revenue loss except that most of the people on data plans have a flat rate package so it does not bother the operators.

This is despite the announcement last month about Huawei and Qualcomm successfully completing their IOT with Telecom Italia. Orange and T-Mobile has been trialling MBMS based on TDtv technology but lets accept the fact that it is TDD-MBMS rather than the FDD-MBMS which other manufacturers like Qualcomm, Nokia and Ericsson are (were) actively working on.

I read this blog some days back and it emphasised what I have been saying for years now that there will always be multiple technologies floating around. MBMS could be a starting point for Mobile TV but as the demand grows it will have to be supplimented by other specialised technologies like DVB-H, DMB-T, MediaFLO, etc, etc.
For the time being, rest in peace MBMS.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

It would be nice if you could share the source of all this information, if it is indeed accurate. "someone told me" does not seem to be a strong argument.

Zahid Ghadialy said...

Dear Anonymous,

If you read the sentence properly, it says "Somebody told me on condition of anonymity". This means that taking that persons name would cause him lot of trouble. Secondly, this is main difference between blog and actual news articles where naming sources are important.

Cheers.

Anonymous said...

Actually for R7 MBSFN FDD, there is a lot less action in the standard than the TDD version in 3gpp.