36 Monday 16.09.13 theibcdaily Q&A
Patrick Henry president & CEO, Entropic
Has IBC come at a good time for the electronic media industry? Why? Definitely. The set-top box (STB) market continues to innovate and allow global Pay-TV operators to introduce new consumer consumption devices to satisfy consumers’ desires for more content – anywhere. In fact, a July 2013 report from IHS, reported global STB shipments for cable, satellite, terrestrial and IPTV markets would climb to 269 million units this year, up 8% from 250m in 2012. The firm also expects shipments to grow through 2015; indicating that we need events like IBC to share and showcase the next big STB innovations.
What do you think are the key developments in your market sector at the current time? Globally, we’re seeing the STB industry thrive as established pay-TV markets make the transition to HD and are being more aggressive in deploying gateway/client architectures. In emerging pay-TV markets, we are seeing new STB deployments in regions like India as they undergo their shift from analogue to digital TV and in Latin America where there is
Keeping it simple
The input device remains an integral part of the viewing experience, according to Ferdinand Maier, CEO, ruwido
I’m often asked about how I see the future of the remote control in the evolution of the TV landscape and my response is the same; the input device remains an integral part of the viewing experience and crucial to the way consumers discover, access and share content in that most social of spaces – the living room. We have seen many
an increasing interest for more basic STBs, known as zappers.
Why should delegates visit your stand at IBC? Entropic is showing STB silicon innovation from across our portfolio of STB system-on-a- chip (SoC), Multimedia over Coax Alliance (MoCA) and satellite single-wire cabling technologies. We are steadfast in our mission to transform the connected home and drive the Pay-TV industry forward – from developments on the Comcast IP-Client Reference Design Kit (IP-RDK) and delivering the industry’s most mature MoCA 2.0 chip for home networking to showing advanced digital single-cable solutions for direct broadcast satellite operators. 2.C27
passing fashions within the industry, most recent of which was the hype around 3D TV. Although there was a promising start, the majority of 3D channels are beginning to be phased out because they are just not convenient enough to use. The lesson that needs to be
learnt from this is that it is important to keep it simple for the user, and to keep in mind that for entertainment within the home, the living room represents a unique context. The concept of navigating
the user interface of the TV with new forms of interaction like hand gestures or device movements has become accepted as a possible means of controlling devices due to its success in video games.
Ferdinand Maier: ‘The remote control is not a
passing fad’
However, our studies have shown that people are not overly keen on making outlandish gestures in front of the TV set to change the channel or the volume. Over the last few years,
touch-based input has also been put forward as a potential enhancement or even a replacement for the traditional remote control interface. Though touch interaction has become
Opinion
increasingly important with the rise of smart phones and other companion devices, it still seems to have several difficulties to enter today’s living rooms in terms of navigation. Recent studies have shown
that 50% of the time that people spend watching TV, mobile phones and tablets are being used in parallel. But it is important to distinguish that these companion devices are being used for tasks other than controlling the TV, such as for social media, or for the consumption of second screen content. What will remain is the
fundamental wish to simply watch TV in the context of the living room. Given the choice, users will always select the form of control that enables them to reach their goal efficiently, effectively and in an entirely satisfactory way. Sitting in front of the TV and watching the chosen content with family and friends is one of life’s pleasures and one of the easiest things to do is still to change channels or to increase volume while receiving haptic feedback. The remote control is not a
passing fad or a momentary trend – it’s here to stay, powerful and intuitive enough to meet the challenges of a fast- changing industry. 1.F68
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