ITV set to offer shows via mobile

A

recent report by the Wireless World Forum suggested that the majority
of 3G markets saw 100% growth in the past year, with nearly 40% of all
UK users under aged 24.

ITV, which has taken a battering in the
traditional TV ratings with its reality line-up in recent weeks,
believes shows such as I' m a Celebrity... are perfect fodder for the
mobile generation. The broadcaster has signed up with Mobile
Interactive Group to look at bringing this and other hit shows to the
3G platform. Broadcasters will get a percentage of the money raised by
users when content is downloaded.

MIG claimed that phone users
would be "blown away" when the shows hit their mobile screens in the
next few months. Jane Marshall, controller of ITV Interactive, which is
launching its own mobile portal as an umbrella for the
soon-to-be-launched services, said the mobile content it planned to
roll out this year was like nothing seen so far in the UK.

"We are developing mobile services which will enable our viewers to interact like never before," she said.

Barry
Houlihan, managing director of MIG, who has worked on multi-media
content for shows such as Big Brother and Pop Idol, said: "ITV has seen
the opportunity to launch mobile services across their platform.

"The
company has really put a stake in the ground and wants to move into new
services like 3G video and MMS [Multimedia Messaging Service].

"They
want to make mobile a focal point of as many productions as possible."
Instead of simply showing the same footage as is shown on TV, MIG is
planning to produce content specifically for mobile, which will be more
suitable for the much smaller phone screens.

It will also run more traditional SMS services for ITV shows such as the X-Factor and Who Wants to be a Millionaire ?

Broadcasters
are now talking about the millions to be made in mobile and ITV is
hoping to trump Channel 4, which has also earmarked mobile as a key
strategy. C4 has also launched its own mobile portal,
mobile.channel4.com, which it will use to enable phone users across
almost all networks to access its mobile content – and which may soon
include specially commissioned TV for mobile.

Riccardo Donato,
head of mobile, business development at C4, said: "To us, mobile is a
strategic platform along with the broadband and digital TV."

Donato
said C4 was looking into "specially commissioned shows" for the portal,
alongside video downloads, clips and SMS services and it has also
entered agreements to provide content to telecoms companies, including
Orange and BT.

BSkyB has followed C4's lead and launched Sky
Mobile, a downloadable service giving mobile users across different
networks to access all its mobile content.

However, sources at
Sky suggest that this is more to do with demand from operators keen to
get their hands on Sky content, rather than the other way round.

Mobile
is not such an attractive proposition for Sky, with its subscription
model, as it is for the likes of C4, which is keen to expand its brand
across other types of media. One of the key areas C4 and ITV will be
exploring is the possibility of advertising revenue following the
content, with firms such as MIG having already developing technology to
allow bespoke brand advertising campaigns on 3G.

MIG's Houlihan
said: "It's about recognising who are the early adopter brands and
getting them to commit. The technology is very much there."

Donato added: "Now is the time for broadcasters to focus on what they make of this platform.

"The
key thing is going to be to establish that the demand is there. Once
that happens, opportunities, including the advertising potential of the
platform, will follow."

The
deals signed so far between producers, broadcasters and operators,
mostly involve each getting a share of the money for mobile users
downloading particular TV "events", although companies are also
investigating the potential of subscription models for mobile content.

One
potential drawback for broadcasters looking to cash in on the success
of mobile, however, lies in the power over certain shows held by
independent production companies, like Celador International, which owns the format
for a number of shows including Who Wants to be a Millionaire?

ITV
may be planning to film bespoke mobile versions of inhouse productions
such as Celebrity…, it may face more of a battle in the future to share
the spoils with others. The X-Factor , for example, which is produced
by FremantleMedia "We retain the rights for mobile applications,"
insisted Dominic Burns, who is head of advertiser relations and
sponsorship revenue at Fremantle.

"We're very aware of the
opportunities and we're having discussions in this area. 3Gpenetration
is moving fast and represents a huge opportunity for us."

Asked
if producers would end of doing deals with broadcasters, or simply take
the content direct to the operators, he said: "We're all entering a
brave new world and people will have to adapt."

The brave new
world of mobile television

ITV's plan to muscle in on mobile comes in
the wake of moves by a series of the mobile operators to turn the
platform into the next big thing in media.

Last month, Orange
became the first operator to launch a TV service on 3G, including news
services from CNN and ITN and the streaming of live pictures from the
Big Brother house, courtesy of Channel 4 and from the antics of
Celebrity Love island, via a tie-up with ITV.

Virgin Mobile has
since announced a pilot involving a deal with BT, which will allow
customers to watch a number of TV channels, including Sky News and Sky
Sports News, and listen to 50 digital radio channels, using space
originally set aside entirely for digital radio.

BT has predicted
that mobile devices will become the main way people will receive
entertainment within the next decade and Virgin is understood to be
planning the launch of a far wider-reaching service, with many more
channels, in the near future. O2, working with NTL, has chosen Oxford
as a test ground for a new technology known as DVD-H, which will become
the first direct to mobile TV broadcasting.

The test includes
channels such as Cartoon Network, Discovery Channel and even the
seemingly least enthusiastic of the mobile players, Sky, which is
testing two of its channels.