Saturday, August 25, 2007

IPTV Regulatory Battle in Argentina

Fixed line incumbent Telefónica de Argentina will continue preparing for an IPTV launch even though it was warned by the Argentine regulator, Comfer, that it does not have the authorisation to do so. The company has stated that it would invest $98 million to launch an IPTV service called Speedy TV by the end of 2007.

Comfer has threatened to confiscate Telefónica ’s licence if it goes ahead and launches Speedy TV without authorisation. The government is drafting a new telecommunications law that will allow operators to offer bundled services of TV, voice and Internet over a single network. It appears that little work will be completed on this new law until the political in October are complete.

Regulatory issues seem to be a problem in Latin America. TelcoTV providers in Brazil are limited to only video on demand services. The market their should be strong, but it will pay not to get overly enthusiastic about this market. It will take a while for all of these issues to be resolved.

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