Koreans to buy over $200m worth IP STB in 2008

If the authorities remove restriction on live broadcasting, IPTV providers Hanaro Telecom and Korea Telecom plan to purchase $200 million worth of IP STBs together with LG Dacom in 2008. The deregulation to this effect is expected sometime in May this year.

The overall investment amount for IPTV is a whopping $15 billion that includes $10 billion for overall network upgrades and IPTV equipment purchases of about $350 million. IP STB is obviously biggest piece in the equipment purchase. The commitment by the companies to invest may speed up the expected deregulation which allows the IPTV providers to offer all types of broadcast content including live TV.

There is a somewhat similar regulation in Japan where IPTV providers (unless they are cable TV licensees as well) are not allowed to offer live TV. As in Korea, these Japanese providers are offering Over-The-Top TV (OTT TV). OTT in Korea and Japan have a collective subscriber base of over 1 million.