KUALA LUMPUR – Continuing the strong momentum to launch a next-generation TV service by the end of next year, YTL Communications has signed agreements with RTM (Radio Television Malaysia) and Primeworks Studios of the Media Prima Group to collaborate and further enhance Malaysia’s local TV experience and propel the nation into a regional digital broadcast hub.
Under the agreement, YTL Communications will work towards hosting Media Prima and RTM’s existing local channels and content on its next-generation TV service, using technology based on a hybrid DVB-T2 and WiMAX set-top box (STB) from US-based Sezmi Corporation.
In October this year, YTL Communications inked a licence and service agreement with Sezmi Corporation to deploy a wireless hybrid TV service in Malaysia and the Asia-Pacific.
YTL’s wireless hybrid TV service is an advanced, digital TV service that will seamlessly integrate traditional TV and Internet content, while automatically recommending, recording and organising the viewer’s favourite shows. It is a continuation of YTL’s journey to bring Malaysia into a true digital era following the launch of its ‘Yes 4G Mobile Internet with Voice Service’.
A YTL Communications spokesperson told APB that, by 2011, YTL expects to operate a quadruple-play service with data, voice, fixed TV and mobile TV services on three screens — TV, PC and smartphones — all via a single 4G network.
YTL’s hybrid TV service will also offer more alternatives for Malaysian viewers, with the company “actively seeking and signing up with more content providers for an extensive range of choices”.
Content from RTM and Media Prima, offered on the hybrid TV service, will mirror those currently available on Astro, Malaysia’s dominant pay-TV service provider. When contacted, Astro declined to comment.
Datuk Ibrahim Yahya, director-general of RTM, said: “With YTL’s next-generation TV service, we are accelerating the government’s plan to digitise broadcast by 2015. This certainly bodes well for our local content industry, as it will spur digital media creation called for by domestic and regional demand.”
The launch of YTL’s wireless hybrid TV service comes as demand for Web-connected TV services begins to gain increasing popularity around the world. Come early next year, UK audiences will witness the debut of YouView, a free-to-air digital TV service that allows viewers to access Web-content on their TV sets.
Dato’ Amrin Awaluddin, director of Primeworks Studios and group MD of Media Prima Berhad, affirmed: “Together, we will make Malaysia the regional hub for digital media and content. I’m positive that through our existing content and the new productions that we will be making together, we will grow to serve a market that is beyond the 28 million people of Malaysia and reach to the billions across the Asia-Pacific.”
Commenting on the agreements with RTM and Primeworks Studios, Tan Sri Dato’ Dr Francis Yeoh, executive chairman of YTL Communications, said: “I am very pleased with this collaboration and I thank both RTM and Media Prima Group for their support of YTL’s efforts to make Malaysia a fully converged wireless quad-play country. This will cement our position as the world’s most advanced wireless country.”
The challenge, an industry observer tells APB, will be getting 6.5 million STBs into Malaysian homes by 2015, while a nationwide wireless broadband connection also needs to be in place.
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