EXCLUSIVE: A brand new Australian IPTV Company called iStreamTV is set to launch this month. The service will deliver full HD 1080p content to Smartphones, Tablet PC’s and IP enabled TV’s, however analysts are claiming that the Company will struggle up against the likes of Foxtel, Telstra TV and Fetch TV.
As part of the new service users will get a brand new set top box made by US Company MatrixStream Technologies but what has not been explained is where the content for the new service will come from or which ISP’s will partner with the new Company.
Tim Renowden an analyst with research group Ovum said “Fetch TV has done a good job of locking down the ISP’s that compete with Telstra and their T Box service. It’s going to be very hard for any new player as Foxtel Telstra and Fetch TV have locked down a lot of the content deals”.
“Fetch TV has got a good head start with Optus and iiNet and any wholesaler of IPTV hardware services is going to find it tough going especially in the Australian market”.
The Company operating the new iStreamTV service is Fibredyne Pty Ltd who recently secured exclusive distribution and operating rights for the Maxistream IPTV, and XMS technology which the Company claims is one the founding technologies for Video On Demand (VOD) and streaming media channels.
Fibredyne CEO David Magri said that their IPTV service will enable small content providers to distribute content to users that were previously unattainable whether it was due to geography or infrastructure.
“Our system generally requires no special configuration in the local carrier exchange or in the home by the end user and is carrier agnostic” he told SmartHouse.
“Our system is optimized for ultra low bandwidth where SD and HD generally require a ADSL2+ connection with <1.5 Mbps for SD (720p) and < 3.5 Mbps for HD (1080i and 1080p). Users can utilise either a PC Player or dedicated Set-top box to access both VOD and Streaming content” Magri said.
Fibredyne said that they have already trialled the system in Sydney, Melbourne, ACT and QLD and that all of the content that goes across their network is fully encrypted from end to end so that users can not remove and store content unlike other web based technologies on the market.
