Digital TV surpasses analogue in Italy
April 1, 2010
From Branislav Pekic in Rome
For the first time, digital has overtaken analogue as the main television distribution platform in Italy. In February, the digital TV platforms (DTT, satellite, IPTV) were responsible for 51.2 per cent of the total TV consumption in Italy. The most popular of the three is DTT, which has 35 per cent of the total TV audience and is worth 69 per cent of the total digital TV market. Satellite is stable at 15.2 per cent while IPTV has a marginal role, with a 0.4 per cent share.
Meanwhile, the number of Italian households equipped with a DTT receiver at the end of January rose to 15.683.000, according to figures published by E-res/Makno, which also show a growth of 400.000 units on December 2009. The number of DTT boxes present in households grew more than proportionally to the number of DTT families, as a considerable amount of new receivers is purchased for the second/third TV set at home.
In late January, some 24.177.000 DTT boxes were present in homes, an increase of about 1.1 million units compared to December.