Tech Shout!

Reliance Infocomm has introduced near synchronised television on mobile by video-streaming the live telecast of two leading news channels - Aaj Tak and NDTV on mobile phones. With this move, India has become a pioneer of the TV mobile business. Until now, South Korea was the only country offering this service.

Mahesh Prasad, president, applications solutions and content group, Reliance Infocomm said, There are different ways of doing this, such as Digital Video Broadcast Satellite (DVBS) and Digital Video Broadcast Terrestrial (DVBT). We are experimenting with different technologies.

The video streaming service was originally announced a few months ago and is presently available on Nokia 6225 and Nokia 6235. The live TV is offered by both CDMA and GSM operators. CDMA technology is at an advantage because it can offer speeds up to 144 Kbps that allow video streaming for live television even though there is a pause of seven to 13 seconds because the content has to be converted into a mobile-recognisable format that can be streamed

To avail the live mobile TV offered by Reliance, the subscriber has to pay Rs 15 per view which is independent of the time spent on the channel. Each session counts as a view. In contrast, video clips from an array of channels like CNBC, Aaj Tak, NDTV, IndiaTV are charged at a flat monthly fee of Rs 25 or Rs 3 for a day’s access.

Prasad said Current mobile technologies in India do not support live broadcast of channels to the phone. It requires different types of handsets and mobile broadcast technology.

The Finnish mobile TV project had earlier experimented with it by glowing the IAAF World Championships in Athletics in Helsinki, the first international sporting event to be on mobile TV.