Europe’s SES Astra Seeking Standard for Satellite 3D Broadcasts

BERLIN -- “Achieving a standard for broadcast 3D is our objective,” CEO Ferdinand Kayser of SES Astra satellite broadcasting of Luxembourg told reporters Wednesday. “We recognize the need for this, or users will be lost,” Kayser said: “The lack of a standard is not an advantage for broadcasters, it’s not an advantage for viewers and it’s not an advantage for the industry. We have already said that we will issue a communique on this in 2010 and we now expect to have something positive to say over the next few weeks, or months."

SES said satellite broadcasting, with 77 million European households has passed cable, with 71 million. Astra accounts for 52 million of the satellite homes and Eutelsat the rest. About 92 percent of satellite homes get digital service. Only 34 percent of cable homes do. Terrestrial TV reaches into 86.5 million European households, and 48 percent have gone digital, Astra said. “There have been landslide losses for digital terrestrial in Germany,” Kayser said. “Terrestrial TV in Germany is now 100 percent digital but with reduced cover.”

Astra broadcasts 114 HD channels to 6 million HD viewing homes, and 125 million HD-ready sets have been sold in Europe since HD began in 2005. “No extra investment is needed for 3D,” Kayser said. “The satellite infrastructure is transparent and most broadcasters are using transmission systems that work with existing HD receivers. So viewers can keep their receivers and only need buy a new TV. Sky and Canal+ are planning 3D services for as early as April."

"We are fully aware of the issue,” Kayser said when we mentioned that broadcasters can transmit 3D to HD receivers in many ways -- such as side-by-side, top-and-bottom, interlaced and quincunx/checkerboard coding -- but satellite receivers don’t have the new HDMI Version 1.4-standard connectors that support 3D flags to control a 3D TV. “The situation is similar to that in 2004, when we were making the first HDTV broadcasts,” Kayser said. “We are already talking with the industry and the European Broadcasting Union. 3D is moving at breathtaking speed. It’s the trigger for the next big wave after HD. But there are no technical standards and nothing is clearly set out.”