BT launched its Total Broadband Anywhere service today. It is available to Option 3 broadband customers starting at an additional £5/month and includes a free smartphone. The contract is for a minimum of 18 months. The “50” option (£5/month) includes 50 minutes and 50 texts over Vodafone’s network. Higher price packages are available, up to £35/month, which includes 600 minutes and 700 texts. All packages include unlimited WiFi downloads and 10MB of data over GPRS connections. Two BT ToGo smartphones are available initially, both from HTC (whose brand is also on the devices) – the HTC S620 and S710. BT’s Gavin Patterson told us that he was working with other phone vendors and expected more devices to be available in future. 3G is also a possibility for the future, although BT does not believe it is necessary today, and clearly there are other network access technologies, such as Wimax, which may come along as well. The basis of BT’s Anywhere package is WiFi, so the devices will connect to the home wifi network, BT FON hotspots (currently 82,000 in the UK and an additional 190,000 worldwide), and 2500 BT Openzone hotspots in the UK and Ireland. The devices are based on Windows Mobile and preconfigured with customers’ BT Broadband settings, so that BT Yahoo email works “out of the box”. Other email accounts are also set up easily, simply by inputting an email address. Mobile security is also integrated. BT Broadband Talk is available at WiFi hotspots. I asked BT if this announcement represented the company’s mobile strategy, and the answer is a qualified “no”. It is first and foremost an extension of the company’s broadband offer, and gives customers the option to use a portable broadband device in mobile situations. If BT Broadband customers choose to drop their mobile service provider, the BT ToGo phones clearly allow them to do this, at a cost. Although BT wouldn’t put a number on it they clearly expect that a reasonable number of broadband customers will use BT ToGo as their main mobile service over time. At the same time they claimed they were not going “head to head” with other mobile service providers like Vodafone and Orange. If ToGo does start displacing mobile phone contracts, this could clearly change. The biggest concern with BT's approach is that it relies on a network partner's 2.5G service outside of WiFi hotspots. 10MB does not go very far for web browsing or any serious media applications, and while BT suggests most people will be happy just to download a few emails, it remains to be seen whether this will be a limitation for most users. Client Reading: Google-backed FON Movimiento: Peace, Love and Free WiFi

Today's launch of the first dedicated free-to-air satellite service, Freesat, will help inject some much-needed competition into the UK's HDTV market. Even though its HD performance has been disappointing, Sky Digital remains the only major source of HD broadcast content in the country, notwithstanding Virgin Media’s offer of on-demand HD video. Freesat has been four years in the making and is a joint venture initiative of the BBC and ITV. 17.9% of the latter, of course, is still owned by BSkyB. Although Sky has been directed by Ofcom to reduce this stake, the matter is currently under appeal. Whatever the result of that lengthy dispute, Sky’s holding does not seem to have prevented ITV taking the significant decision to restrict its own soon-to-be-launched HD service to the Freesat platform, thus providing Freesat with a competitive advantage over Sky’s HD service, whose paying subscribers will not be able to see ITV HD. How much of a disadvantage that is for Sky, only time will tell. But given the paucity of choice in HD broadcasting today, and the continued popularity of ITV programmes, it should at least provide some pressure on Sky. The other HD channel on Freesat, BBC HD, is also available to Sky viewers. ITV and the BBC, more than most, will be regretting the exit of England and the other home nations from the finals of the European Championships, for which they will be providing live coverage. Live games in HD could have provided a significant boost to Freesat uptake. The major difference from Sky of course is that Freesat viewers will not have to pay a monthly subscription for their HD programmes. BBC and ITV alone would not appear to be a huge attraction for viewers to buy and install new HD set-top boxes at £200 or more, so much will depend on persuading other channels to launch HD over the coming months. As we have discussed, free-to-air HDTV (excluding well-funded public broadcasters like the BBC) is a challenging business model until wider platform reach has been established, so we can expect Sky to continue to lead in HDTV service adoption. But competition is usually a good thing, and Freesat will put modest additional pressure on Sky to improve its own range of channels and bring costs down. Freesat channels at launch are listed below (EPG channel numbers in brackets). There are in fact around 40 discreet mainstream TV channels. The remaining 80 comprise shopping, radio and regional feeds of the main BBC and ITV channels. Entertainment (101-199) BBC One (101) BBC Two (102) ITV1 (103) C4 / S4C in Wales (104) BBC Three (106) BBC Four (107) BBC HD (108) ITV2 (113) ITV3 (115) ITV3+1 (116) ITV4 (117) S4C Digidol / C4 in Wales (120) E4 (122) More4 (124) Zone Romantica (135) Zone Thriller (137) News and Sport (200-299) BBC News (200) BBC Parliament (201) S4C2 (202) Al-Jazeera English (203) Euronews (204) Movies (300-399) Film4 (300) True Movies (302) True Movies2 (303) Movies4Men (304) Movies4Men2 (306) Lifestyle (400-499) Wedding TV (402) Overseas Property Channel (411) Men and Motors (450) Music (500-599) Chartshow TV (500) The Vault (501) Scuzz (502) Bubble Hits (503) B4U Music (504) Children (600-649) CBBC (600) CBeebies (601) CiTV (602) POP (603) POPGirl (604) Tiny POP(605) Special Interest (650-699) Teachers TV (650) Radio (700-799) BBC Radio 1 (700) 1Xtra BBC (701) BBC Radio 2 (702) BBC Radio 3 (703) BBC Radio 4 FM (704) BBC Radio 4 LW (705) BBC Radio Five Live (706) BBC Radio Five Live Sports Extra (707) BBC 6 Music (708) BBC 7 (709) BBC Asian Network (710) BBC World Service (711) BBC Radio Scotland (712) BBC Radio nan Gaidheal (713) BBC Radio Wales (714) BBC Radio Cymru (715) BBC Radio Ulster (716) BBC London 94.9 (718) Shopping (800-849) QVC (800) Price Drop TV (801) Bid TV (802) Pitch TV (803) JML Lifestyle (810) Interactive (900-949) BBCi Regional (950-999) also accessible via BBC One/BBC Two BBC One London (950) BBC One Channel Islands (951) BBC One East (W) (954) BBC One Northern Ireland (957) BBC One Scotland (960) BBC One Wales (964) BBC Two England (968) BBC Two Northern Ireland (969) BBC Two Scotland (970) BBC Two Wales (971) ITV regionals accessed via ITV1 London (not listed separately) Ulster STV Scottish East STV Scottish West ITV1 Wales ITV1 Border England ITV1 Central West ITV1 Granada ITV1 Anglia East Channel TV STV Grampian North Client Reading: HDTV Channels Shut Down: A Sign Of Things To Come?

Much hype in the last 24 hours about yet another new IP video venture. Sezmi, formerly known as Building-B, has received $17.5 million in funding from venture capital firms and includes prominent engineers Buno Pati and Phil Wiser (formerly of Sony) as its founders. It hasn’t disclosed where its initial trials are taking place, nor who its broadband service provider partners are, but is now at least public about its intended offer. However the company tries to spin it, Sezmi’s new service is pretty much a reiteration of many previous attempts to use digital terrestrial television to compete with cable network providers like Comcast. Predecessors have included USDTV, Geocast and iBlast, and the most recent, Moviebeam, gave up in December last year after attracting a paltry 1800 subscribers. All these services have tried, one way or another, to use capacity in the digital TV broadcast spectrum to increase the range of programming and choice and offer an alternative to cable TV. As with Moviebeam, Sezmi will use a DVR set-top box to store programmes and give viewers a quasi-VOD experience through an integrated program guide. And it’s certainly an impressive DVR – the 1TB hard drive could store 1000 hours (42 days) of video depending on quality settings. Unlike Moviebeam, Sezmi will also use a broadband connection to download programmes, alongside the over-the-air broadcast signal. And it’s the broadband part that Sezmi claims makes it TV 2.0. It suggests that it will partner with broadband service providers, while at the same time claiming that infrastructure costs are low. Given that BSPs are moaning about the cost of transporting rapidly growing mountains of IP video, I suspect that Sezmi’s position on infrastructure costs may fall on deaf ears in the telco community. What Sezmi is doing, of course, is trying to replicate what is already happening in Europe, where telcos (eg BT Vision) are combining DTTV with IP video to create a quasi-IPTV service. There are several key differences, however. First, Sezmi is not the telco, and does not provide broadband service, so until it sorts out that part of the equation it’s not clear whether company will be competing as an over-the-top provider or simply enhancing existing managed BSP packages. Second, the US DTV service is simply not as consistent as what’s available in many parts of Europe. Sezmi claims it has developed advanced indoor antennas for the ATSC system, but until we see this perform in the real world we will have to reserve judgment. Sezmi is targeting non-digital TV customers in the US, so it had better get a move-on. The 10% or so who still really solely on analogue terrestrial will have decided what to do after switchover within the next 12 months, and those using analogue cable will be tempted with new cable offers to switch to digital. One way or another, Sezmi in its current form looks like it will go the way of its not-so-illustrious predecessors. Client Reading: US IPTV Forecast and Outlook: $13.7 Billion by 2012

We have just published a major piece of research into what amounts to a new digital consumer device segment: Mobile Internet Devices (MIDs). With screen diagonals of between 4” and 6” these touch-screen handheld gadgets fill the gap between web-browsing cellphones (smartphones) and miniature portable computers (for example UMPCs and netbooks). They’re the latest attempt by computing, mobile and consumer electronics companies to create a market for handheld gadgets that give consumers access to the full range of Internet applications they are familiar with on their PCs. Our estimates indicate that annual revenues will exceed $17 billion by 2014. Global sales in 2008 are expected to reach 1 million units, and will continue to grow at an average annual rate of 102% to reach 69 million units by 2014. The report also examines the main rivalry in technology platforms between Intel and ARM. ARM dominates the mobile phone industry today, in spite of several attempts by Intel to penetrate this lucrative industry. Intel is hoping that MIDs will finally give it the opportunity to build a significant business outside of its PC market stronghold. A key part of Intel’s strategy will be its Moorestown system-on-a-chip, but until this arrives in 2009 or 2010 ARM-based vendors will be able to use this window of opportunity to establish market leadership positions. The report concludes that the proven advantages of the ARM ecosystem in mobile devices will eventually outweigh those of the Intel platform and that ARM devices will comprise the majority of MID sales thru 2014. Client Reading: Mobile Internet Devices: Heavyweights Do Battle For $17Bn Prize