Chunghwa TV passes milestone, looks to cloud

Ching Min Cheng

Taiwan’s Chunghwa Telecom exceeded 1.1 million IPTV subs in February, having passed the one million mark in November last year, according to Ching-Min Cheng, managing director, multimedia department, northern Taiwan business group at the telco. The operator’s Multimedia On Demand TV service was launched in 2004.

Cloud based and multiscreen services are the next step for the telco, said Cheng. Chunghwa will use its mobile and fixed-line networsk to deliver content to any device, he said. Chunghwa will also enable the use of smartphones and tablets as remote control devices for the main TV. Sixty per cent of Taiwanese view social networks thorugh smartphones and tablets, said Cheng.

Addressing the IP&TV World Forum yesterday, Cheng said the company had also launched web TV in 2010, but the service has been met with a mixed reception so far.

Chunghwa currently offers 133 channels, including 42 HD services, and over 10,000 hour of VOD. Popular interactive services include karaoke on-demand, music videos and horoscopes. About 70% of subscribers pay for additional channel packages, said Cheng.

Chunghwa has deployed advertising innovations including pop-ups during channel changes, bumper ads on its video-on-demand service and personalised advertising, with the ability to drill-down to see more long-form content. Interactive shopping channels and long-form on-demand shopping are also available. Users can use their digital TV smartcards to pay for goods, he said.

Chunghwa has moved to acquire internet content, and delivers, news traffic information and other content specifically for the web. The company has also developed a user-generated content platform with a YouTube like interface and links to Facebook to enable users to share what they are watching.