Ip Datacasting; the Road to Converged Services?

This paper documents the work of the IP Datacast Forum. This Forum has studied the datacasting concept, specifically the complementary implementation of telephony and broadcast technologies, from initial ideas to the development of key specifications. The process has involved the development of basic business and technical models to aid understanding of the potential service capabilities. The formulation of a reference service was a key stage in this process, deriving tangible service concepts from previous study work. Subsequent technical work on a Baseline Specification have taken the concept nearer to the initiation of trial and demonstration activity. INTRODUCTION The IP Datacast Forum is a non-profit association of companies founded in January 2002 to explore the potential business opportunities offered by the convergence of digital broadcast and Internet Protocol technologies. The ten founder companies share a common view that the complementary nature of secure one-to-one mobile telecommunications technology and efficient one-tomany broadcast technology offers significant business potential. The work to date has included studies into the business case for IPDC, the technology requirements and the spectrum issues. The work has embraced the use of both DAB and DVB technologies, with an emphasis on DVB. To reflect this the Forum has also prompted the formation of a 'parallel' DVB group, formed to study the impact of IPDC upon DVB specifications and systems. This paper will describe the work of the Forum to date on the business and technical aspects of IP datacasting. EARLY DAYS The Forum set itself two initial tasks. Firstly, it undertook a preliminary study of the potential business models for IP datacasting. Although each of the member companies, by definition, had envisaged some potential for IP datacasting services none had actually rigorously studied the issue. Secondly, the Forum undertook a similar technical study, highlighting areas where development may need to take