Philip Hunter

A significant TV milestone has been reached with setting of firm standards for the two flavors of Ultra HD, 4K and 8K, by the ITU with help from the EBU.

A French project called SVC4QoE applied Scalable Video Coding over digital terrestrial to send high quality video to moving devices.

The number of HD channels in Europe increased by 198 during 2011 despite the economic crisis.

France’s competition commission has decided to make a detailed examination of the 2006 merger between DTH operators TPS and Canal Satellite.

European broadcasters are taking more satellite capacity to cope with high demand for sports in Olympic year and to expand remote news gathering operations.

Sky has made a long term commitment to investment in UK content by setting up a fund for British film making that will reach £600 million (almost $1 billion) by 2014.

The European HbbTV hybrid TV standard has incorporated support for HTTP adaptive streaming based on the recently published MPEG-DASH specification in its latest version.

Virgin Media is reviving red button interactive services on its TiVo platform

The Eurovision Song Contest staged every year by the European Broadcast Union (EBU) has run into controversy over the choice of Azerbaijan as host country because of its human rights record.

Liberty Global CEO Michael Fries has urged his European cable operators to make the multi-screen experience compelling before trying to make money from it.

Swiss Telco Swisscom has chosen a content recommendation engine from Jinni of Israel for its IPTV service “Swisscom TV,” with the promise of recommendations based on taste and mood.

The Ukrainian National Council on Television and Radio has introduced new must-carry rules for the country’s cable operators.

GET of Norway and Poland’s Multimedia Polska are the latest European MSOs up for sale with Liberty Global’s UPC among the favorites to acquire both.

TV usage is rising sharply in all leading nations surveyed by NPD.

The UK’s hybrid TV platform YouView is launching this week, two years later than originally planned after a series of delays.

Philips and LG have teamed up to form Smart TV alliance and invited their competitors to join.

The UK’s leading IPTV operator BT Vision has increased its subscriber base by 23 percent over the last year despite getting the most customer complaints.

Sky Italia subs have turned downwards after growth in 2011.

France Telecom company GlobeCast has launched its new OTT platform MyGlobeTV in the U.S. with 16 premium Romanian-language channels.

Cloud platforms combined with rights relaxations are helping network-based TV recording take off in Europe.

There were mixed feelings for BSkyB and Telco BT, the two winners of the bidding for English Premier League TV football rights, as they paid way more than they had budgeted for.

Germany’s cable operators have opened two fronts, against broadcasters over carriage rights, and with the regulator over mergers, consolidation and broadband unbundling.