Germany to approve mobile TV project
October 18, 2007
Deutsche Telekom's T-Mobile, Vodafone and O2 have agreed to meet German regulatory conditions to win approval for their venture to broadcast television on mobile phones. The conditions will ensure that competition isn’t hampered. The approval will become final in October provided that it isn’t challenged before then.
The companies agreed not to bundle services and will ensure that programmes can be received on devices other than mobile phones and that customers won’t be obliged to buy both the TV programmes and the mobile-phone services.
T-Mobile, Vodafone and O2 plan to work together to create the technical basis for broadcasting mobile televisions and to buy programmes. The sale of programmes to customers isn’t part of the venture as the products will be marketed individually by the three companies.