Informa Telecoms & Media has announced the winners of the IPTV World Series Awards. The awards were held at the Royal Garden Hotel in Kensington, London and were hosted by TV and radio personality, Paul Ross.

The IPTV Awards Gala Evening took place on the first evening of the IPTV World Forum on Tuesday 23 March 2010. They recognise excellence in embedded client software or intellectual property across all network types, including terrestrial, satellite, cable, IPTV and mobile. They also cover technologies and services relating to Internet-based video over any access network.

The judging panel considered unique features, market impact, and the lessons learnt which can be applied to other networks and markets.

The winners of each category are as follows:

Most Innovative New Service Sponsored by Espial
Winner: PCCW for eye2

Recognises a service launched by an operator or service provider in 2009, and delivered fully or in part over an IP network, which made a significant contribution to service revenues and customer satisfaction. A service or product could be a complete IPTV launch or it could be a new service as part of an existing IP TV offer, such as the introduction of HDTV or DVR for example.

PCCW eye2 stood out as an innovative device that demonstrates a clear commitment to developing new products and services for customers which keep ahead of the competition. The eye2 wireless touchscreen tablet provides television and multimedia services, as well as video and voice calling.

The combination of wireless, Internet and telecommunications technologies represents an ambitious vision that really shows the power of digital convergence. Developing such a consumer device is a remarkable achievement for a service provider.

Best Subscriber Growth Achievement
Winner: China Telecom

Recognises an operator, service provider, ISP or content provider brand that has achieved significant growth in its subscribers for a managed IPTV service during 2009.

Judges praised China Telecom for its high percentage growth over the past year, posting a 275% increase in IPTV subscribers between the end of 2008 and 2009 to reach 750,000 users. This comes despite the difficulties encountered by many IPTV operators around the world in maintaining the same growth rates once significant scale has been reached.

China Telecom's achievement is also praised as being noteworthy for the way in which the company has accommodated a variety of changes in its service platform as the enabling technologies have matured.

Best Interactive TV Service/Application
Winner: ADB for ‘n'

Recognises interactive TV technologies and solutions across ALL network types, including terrestrial, satellite, cable, IPTV and mobile, and also covers technologies and services relating to Internet-based video delivered over any access network. It is not limited to services where the associated video is delivered as IP. However, please note that this category does not include Video on Demand; this award uses a more narrow definition of interactive TV - what people have come to understand by the abbreviation 'iTV'.

Pay-TV operator ‘n', in partnership with ADB, has been a leader in the delivery of hybrid services in Poland, and ADB has been an industry pioneer in enabling broadcasters and service providers to deliver such services.

The 2009 upgrade of ADB's hybrid DVR set-top box for ‘n' was typical of ADB's ability to respond quickly to its customers' needs. ADB's timely implementation of the upgrade to meet ‘n''s requirements was particularly impressive. The deployment testifies to one of ADB's key strengths - the fact that it writes all the software in its own devices.

The deployment enabled ‘n' to steal a march on its competitors by becoming the first provider in Poland to combine the best of the Internet with broadcast TV, offering applications including TV access to content from leading local websites, as well as the ability to schedule recordings remotely via a unified user interface and access.

Best Consumer Device/CPE
Winner: Amino for Amino Freedom

Recognises excellence in consumer equipment, including the initial IP video receive equipment, screens & video consumption equipment, devices that can be paired directly with the initial receive equipment, devices that reside on a home network connected to the initial receive equipment, and devices that can be paired directly with equipment on the home network - provided in all cases that the video consumed is IP video routed to the consumer or home via a network connection.

The Amino Freedom DVB-T hybrid media centre was recognised by the judges as offering the most comprehensive, cost-efficient and user friendly solution to the challenge of delivering online content in a seamless, integrated and user-friendly manner to the consumer's living room.

It achieves this by allowing access to all major formats of Internet-delivered video and to a vast number of applications, including social media, and integrating them in a unified GUI together with locally stored music, video and pictures, and DVR functionalities such as time-shift recording of multiple channels, pause live TV and push-VOD.

Best Quality Improvement Solution
Winner: Witbe

This category covers any technology or service that can be used to test, monitor, report upon, analyse or manage (proactively or reactively) video services delivered over IP-based networks. Technologies covered by this category could include monitoring solutions for picture quality or components of transport streams, and of course, Quality of Service. It also includes any technology or service that can be used to test, monitor, report upon, analyse, manage or in some way impact the overall customer experience in relation to IP video based services.

Witbe has developed new technology for monitoring designed to complement existing solutions that take care of the Quality of Service. It combines an end-to-end system that provides the standard reference Key Performance and Quality Indicators, delivering them through a central system to the people that need to know - the engineering teams, support staff and senior management.

The robot-based system gets to the heart of the problem, generating multiplatform reports, incident analysis, customer troubleshooting and executive dashboards. It has been deployed by IPTV operators around the world, including Orange, KPN, Deutsche Telekom, Telefonica, Vodafone and Singtel.

Best Hybrid Broadcast-IP Video Delivery Solution or Service
Winner: EchoStar for SlingLoaded HDS-600 R hybrid HD DVR

Recognises an operator, network provider, solution provider or ISP for a video delivery service or solution which supports the delivery of video over both the IP and non-IP video networks in parallel.

The judges particularly praised EchoStar's entry for its mix of cutting-edge technology, a simple idea and sound business logic.

The exciting technology comes courtesy of EchoStar's acquisition of SlingMedia a few years back. Slingloaded devices enable the repurposing of content in the home, even if it is protected, so that it can be played back on different devices. The simple idea here is to let users consume content where and when they want to, offering both place and time-shifting in a home networking context, and also a remote access context.

EchoStar's sound business approach is to offer this solution to service operators who can harness its power and simplicity, thereby reducing churn and increasing revenues.
The judges also liked the fact that with the HDS-600R, a strong concept is now a real product sitting under TV sets.

Best On-Demand Technology for IPTV
Winner: Ericsson for WatchPoint Content Management System

Recognises the best on demand technology for delivering a TV service over a managed IP network.

The judging panel commended Ericsson for the broad range of features available on its WatchPoint Content Management System, which allow operators to control the preparation, delivery and consumption of content originating in a wide array of formats, and supporting various playback devices. The centralised content and metadata management system supports both existing and new workflows, while optimising system resources.

Processes can be established, managed and monitored via a Web-based GUI, which supports rule-based business models and can adapt the system to new operational and market requirements. Third party systems for content, scheduling and metadata ingest are supported, as are back office services. Finally, content can be organised into various categories, groups and channels to support operators business needs, with content then delivered in the appropriate format to end-user devices for consumption.

Best IPTV Service Delivery Platform or Client Software
Winner: Netgem for NetgemTV

Recognises an IPTV Service Delivery Platform or Client Software that supports IP-based video delivered via a managed private network.

NetgemTV provides an end-to-end solution that provides both pure IPTV and hybrid IPTV, as well as advanced services such as connected home applications. The solution delivers traditional broadcast TV services in a very coherent and user-friendly manner, as well as simultaneously delivering a large number of advanced functionalities and services to users.

In addition, NetgemTV has built a set of back-end solutions that addresses the needs of broadcasters and other players in the video value chain, enabling different business models to be implemented in a flexible manner.

Best Internet TV Technology/Solution
Winner: Cisco for Cisco Content Delivery System

Recognises technologies or solutions relating to video that is available via the public Internet. This generally means that it can be accessed via a standard web browser and can be found by anybody (although not necessarily viewed by anybody in the case of subscription services). However, video services that are delivered via the public Internet using a privately accessible web address are also included.

With significant customer wins in Western Europe and the USA, Cisco's Content Delivery System is helping operators to embrace new business models and to deliver the "any stream to any screen" promise.

Best Client Software/Intellectual Property Solution
Winner: First Media for m-QM

Recognises excellence in embedded client software or IP (intellectual property) across all network types, including terrestrial, satellite, cable, IPTV and mobile, and also covers technologies and services relating to Internet-based video over any access network.

First Media's ‘m-QM' continuous video monitoring solution assists operators in managing their Capex and Opex costs by decreasing service outage time, reducing customer service calls, resolving these customer service calls, and reducing truck rolls.

First Media's soft client resides on the set-top box, allowing for automatic monitoring of performance parameters such as average bit rate, jitter and packet loss ratio. In addition, quality of experience parameters such as average channel change time and blur can also be analysed.

Special Merit Award for Outstanding Industry Contribution, sponsored by Huawei
Winner: Raoul Roverato, executive vice-president for new growth businesses and transformation at Orange

Recognises an individual who has made an outstanding contribution to the development of the IPTV industry.

Raoul Roverato has been integrally involved in Orange's pioneering deployment of IPTV since 2004, during which time he has been Chief of Staff to the group's Chairman and CEO, Didier Lombard, and has also led different projects to determine how to develop IPTV penetration, how to launch hybrid IP/DTH, how to negotiate premium content deals, and how to create interactive pay-TV packages.

Since March 2008, he has been executive vice-president in charge of new growth, and leads the group's activities in content and Web services, including IPTV. He heads up content and Web product marketing and development, partnerships and acquisitions, customer experience, advertising, and country marketing and monitoring.

Raoul has also done a terrific job in convincing content owners to adapt their business models to accommodate the new and more flexible ways to consume content, as well as stimulating the creation of content with the three screens in mind.

This year, Raoul is heading up the launch of other innovative services, including a portal for connected TV's with LG in France, and interactive advertising on TV.

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