Multimedia Research Group, Inc. announces its new semi-annual IPTV (or IP TV) forecast, "IPTV Global Forecast 2005 - 2009: September 2005," as part of its IPTV Tracking Service. Projecting growth from 3.7 million subscribers in 2005 to 36.9 million in 2009, the report also forecasts subscriber revenue growth from $880 million to $9.9 billion in 2005-2009. "IPTV is continuing to push forward in Asia and Europe, as deployments and trials in Japan, China, and India are really starting to show positive impact," states Bob Larribeau, MRG Senior Analyst. "The U.S. RBOCs (Regional Bell Operating Companies) are still lagging, due to issues that SBC and BellSouth are facing, waiting for low-cost MPEG-4 set-top boxes and Microsoft's software, and dealing with the complexity of the system integration required. Progress in Europe is making up most of the difference."

Based on information from over 270 IPTV carriers worldwide, the report identifies the top carriers in each of four regions (Asia, Europe, North America, and ROW), broken down by seven product/service segments for 2005 to 2009 (Set-top Boxes, Video Headends, VOD Servers, Middleware, Access Equipment, Content Protection and System Integration). "No other report offers 28 discreet IPTV sector analyses plus capital spending profiles of each region's top carriers" states Gary Schultz, MRG CEO. "This forecast provides huge market leveragability to our customers and service subscribers."

Other regional changes analyzed include:

• Growth of European IPTV leaders, including Free (France), Fastweb (Italy), Belgacom, KPN, and Telekom Austria.
• New Set-top Box pricing assumptions based on MPEG-4 (HD and SD).
• New developments in China, Korea, Taiwan, Japan, and Hong Kong.
• Analysis of Per-Port Access System pricing for four regions and globally.
• Updates on SBC and BellSouth plans to deploy large IPTV networks in the U.S., and Verizon's use of IPTV for VOD over its fiber network.

A 60+ page report, "IPTV Global Forecast 2005 - 2009: September 2005," is available in a printed (English) format for US $3,995.00, a departmental PDF license for US $5,200.00, and is free as part of the year-round IPTV Tracking Service. For a PDF corporate license, or to order this report, contact Rob Smith at rsmith@mrgco.com or visit www.mrgco.com.