French mobile operators abandon DVB-H
Thursday, February 11th, 2010
CSA organized yesterday the last meeting to save Personal Mobile TV, which was a failure as the four operators: Orange, SFR, Bouygues and the newcomer Free have opposed to invest in DVB-H.
CSA thought that the arrival of Free will revive the debate but for Free, it is necessary to have a common agreement with all the operators which did not happen. Maxime Lombardini, CEO of Iliad, added that “they did not even have their first subscriber”.
The mobile operators blamed the technology standard, the lack of phones available and as the service is already available on 3G network, the operators refused to invest in a new network.
CSA will still sign the authorizations to broadcast in March and the diferrent actors, except mobile operators, will have 2 months to organize a joint company.
The future of DVB-H seems to be compromised.
