Warning. Shameless self-promotion ahead!

How long does it take IPTV Operators to install their services? That’s the principal question behind a research report I’ve written, called “IPTV Home Networking Strategies” published by Multimedia Research Group.

Aside from home installation times, I also looked at strategies for home networking for IPTV Operators and some new technologies (HANA and DLNA) that promise to make it easier to connect all our IP-related devices in the future. For example, do you k now the differences between HANA and DLNA? Do you know what they are? They’re not used very often right now, but they have great promise in a hyper-connected home.

In performing our research, we surveyed the Top 60 IPTV Operators around the world and asked them about the home installation times from the 1st set-top box to the 3rd STB. We broke down results by geography (Asia, North American and Europe), by home networking technology (HomePNA, Powerline and MOCA) and by 1st, 2nd and 3rd STB installation.

The results? They’re pretty surprising.

• The average total installation time from the curb to 3 STBs is 3.79 person-hours.
• North American IPTV operators had the highest overall total average installation times with 5.16 person hours.
• Europe had the lowest total average installation times: 2.87 person-hours.
• 38% of respondents reported using HomePNA as their home networking technology. the most popular answer.
• HomePNA also had the highest overall average installation times at 4.47 person-hours.
• Of all the home networking technologies, powerline had the lowest overall average installation times: 2.21 person-hours.

Why is the U.S. Slower?

Generally, the U.S. had higher install times because IPTV Operators (AT&T and Verizon primarily) have rolled out their services later than Asian and European Operators. We’re finding that experience helps–installers can teach other installers about best practices and lower their installation times. Plus, North American Operators give customers a more personalized in-home installation experience, whereas Europe for example has more customer self-installs.

Also, Europe tends to use more powerline networking (networking via electrical outlets), which lowers their install times because Operators don’t need to run new wires or drill holes. Despite the popularity of HomePNA, we also found that Operators are still using Cat-5 cable to wire homes, especially in North America.

Another surprising fact was that Operators are using more than one home networking technology. Sometimes it’s a combination of a coax line (HomePNA or MoCA) as well as wireless (usually via Ruckus Wireless, which is targeted at video delivery). Or it could be a combination of Cat-5 and some other wired networking. Clearly, much depends on the home and how many coax lines are already installed as well as how many set-top boxes need to be installed.

Although Operators have chosen their home networking technology, they still like to keep their options when they arrive at a customer’s home–telephone wires, powerlines, coax, wireless or Cat-5. AT&T has chosen HomePNA (coax) as its primary home networking technology, whereas Verizon is using MoCA (also coax).

The report focuses on lots more (best practices, home networking strategies for IPTV Operaties, how each networking technology works) so I can’t cover everything here. (You can purchase it by following the links to the report above.)

However, I will be covering home networking and IPTV installations in future posts. Let me know, via comments, what you’re interested in so I can zoom in on specific areas.

Bonus:Telephony Online did a quick story on this, which basically highlighted some of the results of the survey and provided some quotes from Gary Schultz, managing director at MRG.

Technorati Tags: IPTV, home networking, IPTV installation, MoCA, HomePNA, Powerline, UPA, HomePlug, Ruckus Wireless, AT&T, Verizon, U-Verse, FiOS TV,