Cable TV in Japan
Competitive status in full digital age
Migration for IP Video

Hiroshi ASAMI
asami@catv.or.jp

Japan Cable Television Engineering Association （JCTEA)

1JCTEA: who we are?
 JCTEA: Japan Cable Television EngineeringAssociation
 Mission: To promote cable related technology,
research cable technology issues, human resource
development through certificating Cable Engineer,and promote standardization
 Composed of 600 cable related manufactures,
installers.
 Recent Standard: RFoG FTTH systems
 Similar role as SCTE

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Growth of Cable TV subscribers
 Cable subscribers increasing steadily.
 Cable subscribers number reached 25 million in 2010
 Home pass connected 46.9% households in Japan(households)

3Source Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications

Successful migration to full digital inJuly 2011 Terrestrial analog TV has been be shutdown in July2011
Digital terrestrial TV standard: ISDB-T(OFDM) Digital Cable TV standard: (64)QAM 95% households already own digital television set withdigital terrestrial tuner and HD display
 Terrestrial and Satellite programs are 100% HD

 Cable TV operators are transmitting terrestrial programby pass-through (OFDM) and/or QAMIn addition
 Analog NTSC service by digital to analog conversion tosave analog TV set4

Three screen approach by broadcasters
Digital TVtunersbuild inDigital Terrestrial Broadcasting
System (ISDB-T) is capable withMobile reception

Digital Terrestrial and Satellitetuners build in PC or tuner
cards available

Digital Terrestrial andSatellite tuners are build in5

Growth of Residential Broadband Connection
by Technology(10 thousand)

FTTH includes FTTP(Fiber to the premises + VDSL)
Total Broadband subscribers reached 34 million (70% household in Japan)

6Source Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications

Fastest Cable Internet in the world
To compete with Telco’s FTTH, Japanese cable operators
are providing internet service more than 40Mbps inreasonable price.
Example 2

Example 1classspeedPrice(JPN/US$)

Speedstar160 160/10

5,800 ($73)

premium30/ 24,800 ($60)

Standard

15/ 1

3,800 ($48)

light2/0.256

2,850 ($36)

Price of Cable Internet (270M) is
JPY5,880 = USD74(1USD=80JPY)

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For further development of Cable TV
Pay TV Market in Japan still small Multichannel Pay TV Cable: 8 million households (8M out of 25M)
 Satellite Pay TV: 4 million
 IPTV 1 million

 Pay TV growth still slow
 Incumbent ‘free to air’ broadcasters are still dominant although
the market is saturated
 Competition with Internet Video services began

Low share of Cable broadband in spite of fast speedMyth: FTTH bright future ,Coax: obsolete

Needs breakthroughVariety of new Service; 3D, VOD, DVR, home ICTCooperation among small independent cable operators8

Toward Smart TV
Many TV manufactures alreadyprovide internet ready TV,
remote control applications forSmartphone, and home
network function with Blue-ray
Disc Recorder.

Internet start image

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Next Generation-STB by Japan Cable Lab
Home station for providing smart cable TV service
with high competitive position in terms of cost,convenience and usability
 Low-cost and custom-made STB with hardware commonality andapplication software sharing Smart user interface adaptable to old to young aged custom
 Quadraple service by television, telephone, internet and mobile Audience at a distance by intelligent application, connected withAV appliance and mobile terminal Home ICT service connected with TV phone and infraredcommunication
 Security enhancement using IPv6

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Over-all Service Image
Supported by NG-STB

Advanced
NG-STB
Cable
Television
Television
STB STB

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Android Platform

Down loadAndroid platform on
Next generation STB

CATVApplication

Applications /Contents Provider

Collaboration with other industries

Expansion of CATV industry
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All IP or Hybrid approach IP merits and demerits
Merits: flexibility, good for on demand, longtail programs
entertainment providers
 Demerits: quality control, delay, congestion, fragile network
 Robustness, No delay and no congestion aremust for fundamental broadcasters.
 IP and RF hybrid approach is appropriate
now for homeland security
 Further R&D of QOS management forrealizing full IP broadcasting13

Cable TV in the era of IV VideoBroadband is the essential tool for IP
Video delivery
Migration to FTTH, either RFoG or PON
Evolutional approach rather than
Revolutional
Provide variety of services based on IP
Video technology
Catch up with IPTV, OTT, connected
TV. If not, die.

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Thank You
Our website http://www.catv.or.jp

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