Intel, Crown Castle's Modeo, Motorola, Nokia and Texas Instruments have formed an alliance to accelerate DVB-H deployments in North America. Called the Mobile DTV Alliance, the organization's goal is to foster growth throughout the industry, offering more choices across the value chain from silicon, handsets, services and more. The Mobile DTV Alliance believes this move should allow mobile DTV handsets and services to reach the mass market faster and lower cost to consumers.
Europe is seeing at least 10 DVB-H trials, but U.S. operators are just now working out their business plans. Verizon Wireless has been the only operator to announce plans to use a separate network for high-speed mobile TV using QUALCOMM's MediaFlo, which recently announced Samsung and LG will build phones for the network. Sprint says it will use its spectrum in the 2.5 GHz band for mobile TV. Modeo will launch DVB-H in 30 cities by 2007 with plans to offer 10 video channels and at least 24 audio channels, though the company hasn't signed a programming deal or named any operator partners. The Mobile DTV Alliance wants to prod the rest of the operators along.
For more information about the Mobile DTV Alliance:
- read this press release from Texas Instruments