An International workshop on "DVB-H Mobile TV" was organized by Broadcast Engineering Society (India) in collaboration with DVB-H Asia Pacific Alliance at Hotel Le- Meridian, New Delhi on 25-05-2007. The Workshop was inaugurated by Shri B.S. Lalli, IAS, Chief Executive Officer, Prasar Bharati. The key note speech was delivered by Dr. Helmut Stein, Member, Steering Board and President Marketing and Communications, DVB.

DVB-H is a new technology that allows simultaneous transmission of multiple channels of television, radio and data to a range of multi-media devices including mobile phones, PDA's, PC's and other handheld devices. It is a new concept which is going to change the face of television. It offers a number of advantages which include better reception quality, increased channel carrying capacity, new features such as programme guides to facilitate channel navigation, multi view and interactive services. It brings with it the capability to continually enhance services provided to subscribers, both from a video perspective and from new applications.

The workshop was timed with the successful launching of Doordarshan’s first multi channel DVB-H mobile TV transmission on 23rd of May 2007. The workshop was divided into two technical sessions which were chaired by Mr. D. Ray, Chief Engineer, Doordarshan and Mr. H.R. Singh, Chief Engineer, All India Radio, respectively. The distinguished speakers who deliberated on the subject included Dr. Helmut Stein, Member, Steering Board & President , Mktg. & Comm., DVB, , Mr. L.V.Sharma, Chief Engineer, Doordarshan , Mr. Harri Mannisto, Director, Nokia Nseries Watch New, Multimedia, Prof. Claus Sattler, Executive Director, Mr. Julian Signes, President, C.T.O. and founder Envivio, Mr Ramanan Ganesan, Engineering Manager, MPG, Intel, Mr. John Forslund and Ms. Radhika.

The Workshop provided an excellent opportunity to broadcast engineers and content providers to get an insight in to various issues related to encoding, content protection and content formatting, as well as , business opportunities that broadcast mobile TV brings.It was attended by more than 200 delegates from broadcasting fraternity of engineers, service providers and content managers. The delegates were greatly benefitted by the rich experience and expertise of the distinguished speakers. This workshop was supported by Broadcast Mobile Convergence Forum, DVB Forum and Nokia and sponsored by M/s Shaf Broadcast.

K. Subramaniam
Hon. Secretary, BES(I)