Alcatel and its partners welcome the recent decision by the French Agency for Industrial Innovation's (AII) Steering Committee to support the "Unlimited Mobile TV" program, one of the new AII-sponsored programs to boost industrial innovation.

The goal of the "Unlimited Mobile TV" program is to make television ubiquitously available on mobile phones and PDAs throughout all geographies, including inside buildings, with a wide range of programs and excellent image quality, regardless of the number of viewers simultaneously watching the same program. This universal coverage is made possible thanks to the unique combination of country-wide satellite coverage and terrestrial mobile networks for dense city coverage and interactivity.

As the project leader, Alcatel federates companies like Sagem Communication (SAFRAN Group) and Philips, as well as several innovative SMEs: DiBcom, an expert on integrated circuits for mobile TV reception, TeamCast, a specialist in DVB (Digital Video Broadcasting) standards modulators used for fixed and mobile Digital Terrestrial TV, and UDcast, an Internet video transport and distribution specialist. French university research centers, such as CNRS, INRIA and CEA-LETI are also involved in the project, which opens the door for work with laboratories throughout Europe.

The chosen solution is based on an evolution of the DVB-H standard in a unique frequency range in the S-Band reserved for satellites (2.2 GHz). It also relies on powerful radio coding known as OFDM (Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing) which is well-suited to future generations of mobile telephony. The solution is entirely compatible with DVB-H in the UHF-Band and with 3G mobile telephony, extensively reusing existing 3G network infrastructure (sites, antennas, and base stations). The solution advocated by Alcatel and its partners is adapted for the European continent as well as in large countries like China, India, or Brazil.

Robert Havas, President of the AII Directorate stated: "AII 's mission is to promote and support large programs driving industrial innovation. We selected the "Unlimited Mobile TV" project because it is highly innovative technologically, it is a truly European solution, and because it targets a worldwide market thus creating great business opportunities in France and Europe. As the program leader, Alcatel set up a strong and coherent industrial and scientific group of partners that is able to position French and European technology on this new standard."

Olivier Coste, President of Alcatel's mobile broadcast activities, added: "Together with our top-notch industrial and scientific partners, Alcatel is proud that the Unlimited Mobile TV project was selected in the first group of projects to be sponsored by the AII. Our goal for this program, is to give to consumers in Europe and around the world a high-quality mobile TV service, everywhere and for everyone. We are convinced that, thanks to the AII decision, we will quickly be able to provide all mobile TV operators with a solution that is perfectly suited to the needs of their customers in this promising market."