New venue, expanded conference and exhibition but same old problems for Hungary’s cable industry.
This week’s MediaPlatform in Budapest was in many ways a huge upgrade on what had gone before. In moving the annual cable gathering from the scenic resort of Tihany to Hungarian capital, the organisers have made the event much more accessible, both to local and foreign visitors.
They have also chosen a large, purpose-built facility and despite some teething problems MediaPlatform will almost certainly grow into a major show over the next few years.
The real concern was arguably over the state of the Hungarian cable industry itself. If the truth be told, there was little positive to report back from the conference, both about its current situation and – perhaps more worryingly – prospects for the future.
The main problem appears to be financial. With the economy still in dire straights, smaller operators are finding themselves in serious difficulties and in some cases going out of business.
Additional services such as VOD are meanwhile failing to make an impression, with even UPC, the leading operator, seeing only modest take-up of its largely movie-based service. Some say this could be down to poor marketing: Hungarians are keen TV viewers, spending more time in front of the screen than most other Europeans, and it is much more cost-effective for them to watch an on demand movie at home than go to the cinema.
OTT, too, is also stuck in the starting blocks. Hungary is by no means a backward market, but it now seems to be some way behind such countries as Russia, Poland and indeed Czech Republic in the rollout of such services.
One of the main debating points at the conference was the imminent prospect, from November 1, of the leading commercial broadcasters RTL Klub and TV2 being able to charge cable operators for distributing their channels. Such a thing was not allowed in the analogue era, but with Hungary about to complete the second of its two-stage transition to digital broadcasting everything is set to change.
Yes despite all this, there were still positives to take away. For instance, take-up of digital cable and indeed IPTV services continues to grow impressively and 98% of the population now has access to fixed broadband. Furthermore, the availability of next generation services in Hungary is also higher than the EU average.
