HbbTV Achieves Fifty Members for IBC 2011

European adoption of standard continues to grow

The HbbTV (Hybrid Broadcast Broadband TV) consortium today announced that since opening for membership in May 2011 it has now reached fifty members. HbbTV is an industry initiative that brings together broadcast and broadband TV services into one seamless user experience. The HbbTV standard utilises existing standards and web technologies including OIPF (Open IPTV Forum), CEA, DVB and W3C. Version 1.1.1 of the specification was published by European standards agency ETSI in June 2010. At IBC over thirty companies will demonstrate HbbTV implementations.

HbbTV is inviting organisations to join the consortium to help shape the future of the HbbTV standard. Members have the opportunity to contribute to the various working groups; these groups include the Technical Specification working group where members are encouraged to actively contribute while benefitting from early sight of future specifications. The Testing and Certification working groups offer similar opportunities ensuring that the specification continues to evolve to meet changing market requirements.

HbbTV was first announced to the market in August 2009, since then HbbTV STB’s (set-top boxes) and connected TV’s have been widely deployed into the German Free-to-Air market.

The standard also received support from the French government regulatory body for TV, the Conseil Supérieur de l’Audiovisuel (CSA), with French HbbTV services launched in June 2011.

In Spain there is a wide consensus that HbbTV will be the deployed standard for interactive services. Already several national and regional terrestrial broadcasters have begun rolling out HbbTV services over DVB-T.

Klaus Illgner-Fehns, Chair of the HbbTV consortium said: “We’re pleased to see HbbTV strongly represented at IBC. The formalisation of the membership earlier this year marked another important step for the HbbTV consortium and the take-up following this has been extremely positive. Since its formation HbbTV has received support from across the delivery chain ensuring that the standard represents the interests of the broadcasters, CE device manufacturers and software providers.”