India ripe for IPTV

Microsoft and Reliance Communications will launch India's first high-definition internet television service next year.

The Indian market has all the right conditions for IPTV – a large TV-viewing population which is fond of TV and entertainment, a movie industry which produces the most films worldwide annually, and eased broadcasting restrictions which mean that scores of news and entertainment channels which have sprung up in the past decade.

However, whilst there are about 71-million homes in the country of 1.1 billion people who already have television, 61 percent of them currently have pay TV, mainly through cable and satellite, according to industry figures. Some say this could slow uptake of services, but perhaps it’s really pricing and content deals that will make or break it.