Main players will pick DVB-H for mobile TV

The mobile-TV technology that finally dominates will employ open standards and a competitive market, according to Nokia. "The analogy here is GSM [global system for mobile communication], which made possible personal telephony and affordable terminals," says Harri Mannisto, director of multimedia business at Nokia. "This was based on open standards and a competitive ecosystem, and you have the same possibility here for DVB-H [digital-video broadcasthandheld], which will succeed for personal TV and video."

Mannisto dismisses the idea of devices with multiple mobile- TV technologies, in contrast to Qualcomm, which has announced that it is working on a chip that will support its own MediaFlo technology, along with DVB-H and ISDB-T (integrated services digital broadcasting-terrestrial]. "In the '90s, there was a lot of talk about DECT [digital enhanced cordless telecommunication] and GSM, but you don't hear that now," says Mannisto. "The mainstream has gone with the scale, and I believe the same thing will happen here. There'll be a lot of trials of technologies and some experimentation, but the main players will go with scale, and we believe that's DVB-H." Yoram Solomon, senior director of mobile connectivity at Texas Instruments, also believes that DVB-H will win out against others, including DMB-T (digital multimedia broadcasting for television), ISDB-T, and MediaFlo, but believes that the mobile-phone network will provide a complementary system. "DVB-H is going to be the primary live, streaming model, but, if you want to watch replays or video on demand, then you're going to go to cellular. Cellular is not going away," says Solomon. - Melanie Reynolds Features Editor, Electronics Weekly Nokia, www.nokia.com Qualcomm, www.qualcomm.com Texas Instruments, www.ti.com