The pay-TV market in Western Europe is generally considered to be mature, but the increasing deployment of IPTV services will see the market enjoy a modest rate of growth in the number of households subscribing to pay-TV services, according to the latest research published by Analysys Mason, the premier advisors on telecoms, IT and media.

According to the Analysys Mason report, Pay TV in Western Europe: market sizings and forecasts 2005–2013, the number of households subscribing to pay-TV services will increase at a CAGR (Compound Annual Growth Rate) of 3.2% from 90.6 million in 2007 to 109.2 million by the end of 2013.

Tilgin announces an initial order from one of its global partners to assist them in their end-to-end IPTV delivery to a leading tier one operator in Southern Europe. Tilgin will provide one of the leading global telecom companies and the tier one Southern European operator with Tilgin’s Mood 400 HDTV set-top box solution for IPTV. This initial order for 1700 units is intended for the operator’s IPTV service soft launch in September this year. With this order Tilgin is an important partner in several significant operators’ ongoing IPTV launches in Europe.

This order is a result of the earlier announced global cooperation agreement with the leading systems integrator for inclusion of the Tilgin offering within the systems integrator’s IPTV end-to-end solutions.

Private launched its content for VOD on the Neuf Cegetel IPTV platform in France as part of Neuf's Triple-Play offer. Neuf TV offers more than 200 TV channels, including all leading French and international channels, and a library of 5,000 VOD/SVOD titles, featuring news, series, movies and documentaries. With respect to Private, Neuf VOD will provide access to hundreds of titles from Private's extensive proprietary movie library, including both new releases as well as classic blockbuster titles.

Orange France has decided to launch a web TV service for its broadband customers on April 24, 2008. Both Windows and Mac users with atleast a 512 Mbps connection will be able to access the service via the Orange TV Guide. Users will be able to choose from channels that include: VOD barker channel, France 2, France 3, Orange Sport, France 5, BBC World, Poker Channel, Direct8, France 24, Demain, Liberty TV, Fashion TV, LCP- PS, France 4, BFM TV, I Telé, Trace TV, TV 8 Mont Blanc, Art Channel and France O.

Motorola announces that Swisscom has signed a distribution agreement to deploy mT2a PowerBroadband system in partner hotels across Europe and North America. The mT2a system has been already field-proven by Swisscom in more than 18,000 guestrooms across 10 countries. The mT2a product line was chosen for its ability to maximize the communications experience of hotel guests while minimizing considerably the operation costs.

The mT2a PowerBroadband system is distinguished by the m2 Wallplate which directly snaps on over existing telephone jacks in hotel guestrooms. No additional wiring or rewiring is required. All power and broadband modules are contained within the small Wallplate eliminating the requirement for separate broadband modems and power supplies. Hotels especially like the reduced clutter and clean appearance of the "no box" solution.

At the annual meeting of the DSL Forum, four of Europe's leading telecommunications network operators were elected to the DSL Forum Board of Directors.

The new members include Kevin Foster, of BT; Christophe Alter, from France Telecom; Mauro Tilocca of Telecom Italia; and Marcin Drzymala from Telekomunikacja Polska. Frank Van der Putten of Alcatel-Lucent, Les Brown of Infineon and Phil Skeba of Intel also were re-elected to the board. These strong industry players will help drive the standards work and direction of the Forum, whose activities now involve a much wider scope than its original DSL mandate - including increasing activity around IPTV, fibre deployments and management of the digital home.

Ruckus Wireless has been selected by Telenor to supply Smart Wi-Fi 802.11g systems for the wireless distribution of its popular IPTV service, offered to subscriber homes throughout Sweden through the wholly owned subsidiary Bredbandsbolaget.

Under the agreement, Ruckus Wireless is supplying Telenor with its award-winning MediaFlex 802.11g Smart Wi-Fi systems. The Ruckus MediaFlex systems are being made available to consumers in Sweden through Telenor retail outlets, and can be easily self-installed by subscribers.

Ruckus-patented Smart Wi-Fi technology was selected by Telenor to reduce installation costs, speed subscriber acquisition and give customers greater freedom and flexibility over the installation and distribution of its IPTV service within the home.

JDSU has been selected by Deutsche Telekom to support delivery of its IPTV service. JDSU's NetComplete service assurance system and associated IP test probes will be deployed in Deutsche Telekom's network. The NetComplete solution also includes software that enables monitoring of service quality from central network operations centers, increasing efficiency and reducing the need to deploy technicians to the field. It ensures early recognition of changes in the quality of the streaming video signals, including any decrease in signal strength, prioritizes issues based on alarm levels, identifies the cause of service quality problems and provides reporting tools.

Verimatrix's Video Content Authority System for IPTV has been deployed to secure VOD premium content as part of TUS TELEKOM's IPTV offering.

Through the advanced application of Internet cryptography, including Public Key Infrastructure and X.509 digital certificates, VCAS offers much higher levels of content protection than traditional smartcard systems and automatically identifies security breaches. VCAS for IPTV is designed for two-way networks and has been integrated with Dreampark's middleware and Envivio's headend equipment for the TUS TELEKOM platform.

TUS TELEKOM is a telecommunications provider operating an ADSL network within Slovenian territory, offering the service on two networks; its own and on an incumbent network. Its IPTV service is a response to the growing demand for entertainment and is available initially on the TUS TELEKOM network.

Edgeware announces that the Nordic tier 1 telecom operator TeliaSonera has deployed the Orbit 2x server system to deliver on-demand TV and video services to its rapidly growing IPTV subscriber base in Sweden. Edgeware's distributed server architecture enabled TeliaSonera to cost-effectively integrate on-demand capabilities into its existing network, and to deliver new services to its 300,000 subscribers in record time.

The architecture is based on Edgeware's Orbit 2x, which is a high density, high performance and ultra low power consumption video server appliance. Each Orbit 2x hosts up to 3 TB of flash memory content storage and is capable of reliably streaming 20 Gbps to more than 16,000 concurrent users from anywhere in the network. The TeliaSonera installation consists of both central and edge servers, hierarchically distributed throughout the country, and managed by the Origin remote management system. Content is automatically distributed by Edgeware's Convoy asset propagation system. The installation automatically ingests video content from multiple providers and performs time shift of live TV channels at virtually zero latency.

French IPTV Free Launches New Feature
French IPTV Free launched a new option allowing subscribers to 'broadcast' websites on television. The Telesite service allows customers to restrict the site to their own Freebox or available to all Free users. It also allows customers to upload videos via the TV Perso feature or the Telesite service. Currently these features are only available to Freebox HD subscribers.

Bluwin TV Connected 70,000 in 2007
Swiss IPTV service Bluwin TV connected 70,000 homes at the end of 2007. Bluwin TV is hoping to increase its customer base to 200,000 - 250,000 users by the end of this year. Having added over 100 TV stations, numerous of HD services and radio stations Bluwin TV is still in heavy competition with cable operators.

Deutsche Telekom lowers its pricing of IPTV packages in what's being called a "price offensive". The Entertain Comfort package is now €10 cheaper at €49.95 a month and the Entertain Comfort Plus package will be available for €59.95. The new pricing policy was announced at CeBIt in order for Deutsche Telekom to better position itself in the triple play market.

“Starting in April, our customers will be able to program their media receivers over the Internet from any PC or Internet-capable handset,” said Timotheus Höttges, Deutsche Telekom board member responsible for T-Home Sales and Service.

Deutsche Telekom plans to continue its drive of VDSL and ADSL2+ development. Approximately, 20 million more households will gain high-speed Internet access and with the capability to use IPTV by the end of 2008.

Alcatel-Lucent demonstrates an interactive IPTV portal that will be implemented as a field trial in the city of Friedrichshafen within Deutsche Telekom´s “T-City” project within the next months.

The IPTV portal enables integration of local content, such as video and news. Additionally, the portal enables IPTV users to interact with local content, by rating videos, participating in games and receiving information by clicking on advertising banners.

The CeBIT demonstration and Friedrichshafen deployment are based on Alcatel-Lucent’s 5930 Interactive Media Manager and the Microsoft Mediaroom IPTV and multimedia platform.

Asoka opened its European headquarters in Amsterdam, Netherlands. Running the office will be Asoka's Vice President of Europe, Middle East and Africa Sales and Marketing, Eduard Blonk. Blonk, most recently Senior Vice President global sales key accounts for Siemens, brings extensive telecom industry experience and a strong familiarity of the EMEA marketplace.

As the world's largest market for HomePlug powerline products due to rapid adoption of IPTV, the EMEA office is a key part of Asoka's global growth strategy. Asoka will support existing EMEA customers, including Clearwire Belgium, Clearwire Spain, Clearwire Ireland, Irish Broadband, Eircom and Virgin Media from its local office as well as all new customers in the region.

Espial has signed a reseller agreement with a major Network Equipment Vendor for its Evo IPTV Service Platform. According to the terms of the agreement, the NEV will resell Espial's Evo Service Platform to Telco and Cable operators within targeted regions in Europe. Evo IPTV Service Platform will be offered as part of a complete, turn-key IPTV solution for operators. The identity of the NEV is not disclosed due to confidentiality and competitive reasons.