The new secret weapon for telcos against mobile broadband is IPTV

According to Informa Telecoms & Media, a market researcher, it appears that in an attempt to prevent the increase in customers who are dropping their fixed line broadband connections an increasingly intelligent strategy by telcos is to bundle an IPTV service with their packages.

The number of mobile only UK households in 2007 stood at 15 percent, which was a 2 percent increase on the previous year according to the International Communications Market 2008 report released by Ofcom, the telecoms watchdog. The expectation is that land line uptake will be reduced further with an increase in fat pipe access that is being given to users without having to use a landline, combined with the current downturn in the global economy say Ofcom.
Principal analyst at Informa, Julian Herbert, speaking at the Informa Mobile, Broadband & TV Industry Outlook conference recently in London said “Telcos probably are beginning to think they can’t live without it [IPTV] in the current circumstances.”

An example cited by Herbert was the market in Austrian, which “bottomed out” near the end of last year after an IPTV service was relaunched by Telekom Austria following a steady drop in its fixed line access over the last three years.

He said “IPTV has had a direct effect on the rate of fixed line decline and has… incrementally increased revenue overall. Anecdotally… IPTV reduces churn. It definitely reduces line loss… and the enthusiasm we sense from the telco community for IPTV just is not subsiding.”

As of this month, across the globe over 100 live deployments are taking place said the analyst, adding: “It’s going to continue to be rattling on through 2009. The number of deployments will continue to mushroom.”

In conclusion Herbert said “The [telecoms] world is now all about triple play,” Herbert concluded.