The AMC 9 satellite will distribute IPTV programming in the USA.
PRINCETON, NJ, June 19, 2007 - Satnews Daily - SES Americom, an SES company (Euronext Paris and Luxembourg exchanges: SESG), has launched its Internet protocol television (IPTV) solution, IP-PRIME, which it claims is the most comprehensive end-to-end and turnkey IPTV solution for telecommunications companies.
The entire solution is based on the MPEG-4 digital video standard that offers improved video quality together with greater bandwidth efficiency over the MPEG-2 standard. The MPEG-4 standard makes IP-PRIME suitable for enabling networks to accommodate numerous applications and features, as well as accommodate the explosive growth in high definition television (HDTV) channels.
IPTV is television programming delivered using the language and format of the Internet. The IPTV video programming is transmitted over a closed path, such as high-speed Internet connections like DSL or cable broadband, to a set-top box that’s connected to a television. Because it has virtually unlimited capacity and all of the flexibility and power of Internet-based communications, IPTV features include dozens of HDTV channels, feature-rich video on-demand (VoD) and digital video recording and the ability to integrate non-television Internet-based functionality into the IPTV service.
The IP-PRIME ecosystem employs open, standards-based technologies from multiple world-class technology partners. SES Americom tests and qualifies each third-party technology or middleware component before integrating it into IP-PRIME. By using open standards and ensuring interoperability, SES Americom provides customers with options, and ensuring that their service is leading edge today and well into the future.
IP-PRIME comes with existing transport agreements for over 275 television channels and over 100 digital music channels, giving customers the easiest way to offer a broad range of diverse programming. This program line up includes over 20 HDTV channels, as well as pay per view programming and the ability to offer video-on-demand service. Customers can pick and choose which channels to include in their line-up, and can easily integrate local programming.
“SES Americom has utilized our decades of experience to build an IPTV solution that is the closest thing to flicking a switch to turn on service,” said Bill Squadron, senior vice president of media partnerships at SES Americom. “We invested tens of millions of dollars and over two years developing IP-PRIME, and put the solution through extensive testing so we can be sure we’re offering our customers the most complete, easiest-to-deploy and most cost-effective path for them to offer their subscribers television service. The result of our efforts is that SES AMERICOM is the first company to bring an end-to-end, satellite-based television service to market built completely on the new MPEG-4 video standard.”
After technical trials with large, medium and small sized telcos across the United States, IP-PRIME is now available to any North American telco looking for a fast, cost-effective means to offer their customers a world-class television service, the company said. IP-PRIME gives telecommunications companies the ability to compete and win new subscribers by offering television together with their other services.
Adding television service can be complex and expensive, yet it is a necessary undertaking for telcos to complete their triple play portfolio of voice, data and television services. Telcos of all sizes will find IP-PRIME minimizes the risk of a complex technical integration, simplifies difficult program acquisition challenges and lowers their financial risks for launching a television service.
SES Americom, with more than 30 years of experience in delivering television signals from programmers to cable and broadcast networks, has created a solution that gives telcos and private network operators everything they need to deliver a fully-featured television service over existing network infrastructures. IP-PRIME delivers a complete array of programming channel options, a carrier-grade headend, a choice of consumer set top boxes and multiple middleware solutions that make it all work.
SES Americom said customers benefit from its expertise in television distribution, helping ensure that customers select a proven technical solution, thus reducing both the technical risk and financial cost of deploying a new video service. The IP-PRIME solution not only delivers high-quality video, it also saves customers millions of dollars of capital and operational expenditures when compared to the costs of building their own service.
“Because of SES Americom’s years of leadership and technical innovation in broadcast television, we selected IP-PRIME as the exclusive end-to-end IPTV service for our rural telco members,” said Steve Bing, senior vice president of the National Rural Telecommunications Cooperative (NRTC). “Our members tell us that IPTV service will be a critical component of their service portfolio, and SES Americom is giving them the easiest path to a very comprehensive service. With IP-PRIME, NRTC members will have the fastest path to bring to market a complete and technically advanced television service.”
