The IPTV network offering is currently being rolled out for the King Abdullah Economic City in Saudi Arabia. Ericsson will be providing a complete communication and media distribution infrastructure for this “smart city.” The deal is unique as the customer has demanded all the latest and greatest, from fiber access to next-generation TV services, right from day one.

Peter Linder, Director of Product Management at Ericsson, says with this offering operators can move into the future. “With today’s fierce competition operators are realizing that they will not be successful in the long term if they just try to replicate what was done in the past.”

Olle Tidblad, Strategic Product Manager for IPTV Network at Ericsson, explains that the new business solution provides the necessary broadband infrastructure for IPTV, complementing the IPTV middleware solution launched in September this year. “We now have a compelling complete fixed broadband offering for IPTV-driven, triple-play infrastructure,” he says.

“There are three key updates with the 2.0 release. First is the Gigabit-capable Passive Optical Network (GPON), a point-to-multipoint fiber access technology that takes fiber access to a new level. Secondly, the offering features Ericsson’s IMS solution, which compromises both the infrastructure and the application layer.

“The third highlight is the expansion of our professional services offering for end-to-end IPTV solutions, including system integration and managed services. This kind of offering is key to achieving success in this market.”

Linder explains why an offering update like this is needed. “Now that we’re transporting hi-definition moving images, the broadband networks of the past are like dirt roads. Today we need a modern four-lane highway, which is what this business solution offers.”

He says the IPTV network structure provides four key differentiators.

An IPTV network will offer multi-stream, hi-definition, and unicast. “Because of this, instead of sending one stream to 100 different users, you can send 100 streams that target different individual users,” Linder says.

“Previously, networks targeted one device per service, such as media content on the TV screen, and telephony on the mobile phone. Now you can get services to all types of devices, which means you are targeting a broader range.”

Linder says the third differentiator is that the network structure enables service blending, where TV services can be combined with communication services, creating an attractive offering for end users.

“Lastly, we have changed from being pure consumers to being both consumers and producers of media. User-generated moving pictures require an improved upstream capability so that we can transmit high quality media to the network.”