Broadband plan dials up set-top competition

The House Subcommittee on Communications, Technology and the Internet has postponed its April 15 hearing on set-top boxes. The first time the Federal Communications Commission tried to jumpstart a competitive set-top box market—with the CableCARD initiative—it largely failed.

But if enacted, the commission could have better luck with a new set of recommendations included in the National Broadband Plan issued last month. Those recommendations would require so-called multichannel video programming distributors to install a gateway device aimed at giving end users more choices in set-top boxes. The goal, according to the broadband plan, would be to encourage more creativity in the STB market, perhaps giving rise to devices that combine cable and Internet content or that integrate with mobile devices such as media players and computers. "It could enable the emergence of completely new classes of devices, services and applications involving video and broadband," the plan crafters wrote. The gateway requirement would apply to all multichannel video providers — including cable companies and, apparently, telcos that offer video services. "Today four out of the top 10 [video providers] are not cable companies and represent 41% of [video] subscribers," the plan said. The plan recommends that video providers be required to begin installing gateway devices between the end user and the broadband network for new installations and for installations requiring a replacement set-top box by year-end 2012. The sole function of the gateway device, the plan says, should be "to bridge the proprietary or unique elements of the [video provider] network (e.g., conditional access, tuning and reception functions) to widely used and accessible open networking and communications standards." The goal, the plan authors said, would be to "allow consumer electronics manufacturers to design to a stable, common open interface."