According to a new report from Infonetics Research, the market for worldwide IPTV services will jump to more than $44 billion in 2009. Although DSL providers account for the majority of IPTV services currently available, the research firm predicts that cable MSOs will migrate to an IP-based delivery method in the next few years. In 2004 service providers invested $304 million on IPTV-related infrastructure, which Infonetics expects will grow to $4.5 billion in 2009 as providers increasingly look to IPTV as a means of raising ARPU from a saturated broadband subscriber base.
Apart from highlighting the immediate problem of picking the right middleware provider, Infonetics' report also makes one other singularly interesting point about quadruple play. If the cable MSOs switch to IP in the next few years, and it looks as if this will be the case, offering wireless capability could be their trump card in reasserting their dominance over telcos. The big numbers and figures are always exciting, too--North American subscribers to IPTV will apparently increase 12,985 percent between 2004 and 2009. Step aboard the hype train!
For more on the Infonetics IPTV revenues study:
- read this press release