The number of fixed broadband subscribers will rise to 501 million at the end of 2014, according to new market data released by ABI Research. Of those, about 106 million will subscribe to services delivered via fiber. Fiber broadband subscribers totaled 44 million at the end of 2009.

The number of fixed broadband subscribers totaled more than 422 million at the end of 2009, a 9% increase from 2008. ABI Research industry analyst Serene Fong notes that, “Broadband penetration continues to increase since more service providers are offering triple-play services and driving down access prices.”

Set-top boxes are set to reach Asian consumers at an ever-increasing rate, according to new STB market data published by ABI Research. Overall STB shipments in the region, including those for cable, DBS, IPTV, and DTT television services, will approach 111 million in 2014, the culmination of a compound annual growth rate in excess of 12% over the 2009-2014 period.

While much of the Chinese market demand will be met by domestic vendors, some foreign companies want part of the action. Late last year, for example, Cisco acquired the cable STB unit of Chinese vendor DVN.

Over two-thirds of American pay television subscribers would be willing to switch providers if offered a price discount of 20%, according to a report just published by Strategy Analytics. While Cable customers were the most likely to churn, only half as many (33%) of Telco TV/IPTV subscribers would jump ship. The report, “Digital TV Customer Satisfaction: US Survey Results 2H'09,” surveys 856 digital pay television subscribers in the US.

The newly released IMS Research report Market Opportunities for Internet Video to the TV -2010 edition, reveals that Internet video device shipments will experience global growth of 78% year-over-year from 2009 to 2010. The device categories that will see the most significant uptake in the short term are connected TVs and connected Blu-ray players.

A survey report published by iLocus reveals that 44% of IPTV service providers regard the IPTV technology immature. The technology, according to them, is not robust enough to support a scalable IPTV deployment. The report is based on interactions with 100 IPTV service providers worldwide.

The other challenges facing the IPTV service providers include Absence of Standards, Lack of User Friendly UI, and difficulty they are experiencing in monetizing VOD.

Infonetics Research has published three video-related market share and forecast reports: Video Infrastructure and Subscribers, Set-Top Boxes and Subscribers, and Video Services and Subscribers.

ANALYST NOTE

"The growth pace slowed for new video service subscribers and fewer existing subscribers upgraded to premium services, two unifying trends defining the IPTV and video market in the third quarter. Holiday shopping and new purchasers of HD TV sets will likely result in an up-tick in premium service upgrades, but subscriber growth across the board will be tepid until macroeconomic conditions improve," cautions Jeff Heynen, Infonetics Research's directing analyst for broadband and video.

MRG announces the November 2009 edition of the IPTV Global Forecast - 2009 to 2013, which is the latest update to its May 2009 edition. The new report uses the most recent information on over 800 IPTV deployments around the world, and includes a forecast for IPTV subscribers, service revenue, and system revenue from 2009 to 2013. Additionally, it forecasts over 28 discrete market sectors in 4 geographic regions.

Reportlinker.com announces that a new market research report is available in its catalogue. "The Digital Set Top Box Market: Global Demand Remains High".

Worldwide digital set top box unit shipments are on track to reach 191 million in 2009, a total that highlights the importance of the set top box in today's consumer electronics industry.

The new IMS Research report The World Market for Professional Video Encoding – 2009 Edition reveals that the industry will experience an estimated 19% annual increase in worldwide shipments during 2010, representing an 11% annual increase in revenues over 2009. This includes all broadcast encoders serving the ingest, transcode, distribution and contribution (fixed & mobile) markets. At the end of 2008, cable comprised the majority of distribution shipments followed by IPTV. This trend is expected to continue through 2014, although the CAGR for satellite is forecast to be stronger than any other platform. On the contribution side, revenues are forecast to grow by 17% through 2014 on shipment growth of 18%.

Research and Markets has announced the addition of the "IPTV Market Leaders Report 2009 Edition 2" report to their offering. This IPTV Market Leader Repor identifies which IPTV systems and software companies are leading each of the six IPTV market segments: Access, Video Headend, Video-on-Demand Server Software, Middleware, Set-top Box, and Content Protection/Digital Rights Management. Over 100 vendors are identified and tracked for this report. The MLR includes a breakdown of Asian, European, North American, and Rest of the World regions, as well as overall global leaders. Market positions are measured by tracking actual numbers of active IPTV subscribers that are using (or being supported by) each company's products. Subscriber numbers are gathered and broken down by IPTV sector and regional segment, resulting in rankings.

TelcoTV09 announced that Heavy Reading has discovered new revelations about consumer attitudes toward telco TV in its soon-to-be unveiled 2009 survey, “Making TV Pay: The Telco Challenge.” The new consumer survey, which looks at service provider preferences, satisfaction levels, and churn drivers will be presented by Heavy Reading Research analyst, Aditya Kishore at TelcoTV09) on Wednesday, Nov. 11, at noon EST in Room N220G at the Orange County Convention Center in Orlando, Fla. While many trends identified last year are reinforced by this year’s survey, one of most notable differences is that service bundling is becoming a real competitive advantage for telcos.

While the global recession has dampened growth in digital STB in 2009, the market remains a tremendous opportunity for STB manufacturers and technology providers, reports In-Stat. From 2001 to 2008, the overall digital set top box market grew from 37 million units in 2001 to nearly 190 million units in 2008. Growth turned mixed across STB markets in 2009, with cable set top box shipments declining, while satellite, IP and digital terrestrial segments continued to see unit growth.

MRG announces new leaders in the Global IPTV Market Leaders Report -- October 2009, which tracks the top 120 IPTV vendors in 24 regional sectors based on the installed base of 6 video systems products in over 800 IPTV Operations. Over 80 new Operators have begun IPTV since March 2009, most of those in North America, Europe and the Rest of World regions, totaling over 800 IPTV Operators worldwide.

TM Forum reveals that residential broadband Communications Service Providers are meeting rising customer expectations for rapid service delivery and fast problem resolution. This assessment of residential broadband services is made in TM Forum’s Insights Business Intelligence Report, “Winning in a Shrinking World: Seizing the Opportunities,” based on TM Forum Business Benchmarking studies and Analysys Mason projections.

Customer satisfaction with television service providers has increased considerably from 2008 as a result of improvements in outages and problem resolution, according to the J.D. Power and Associates 2009 U.S. Residential Television Service Satisfaction Study released today.

Overall satisfaction averages 632 on a 1,000-point scale--an increase of 23 points from 609 in 2008, which marked the lowest industry average during the past five years.