Time to adjust your sets

gameboy

In his first interview as the man in charge of digital switchover, Ford Ennals reveals his plans to ensure every household in Britain gets the help it needs

Tessa Jowell is something of an old hand when it comes to dealing with policies that have been honed for years in Whitehall committee rooms, but are blown apart in seconds by last-minute tabloid outrages. The culture secretary must be hoping that digital switchover does not go the same way as her gambling and licensing initiatives - or at least that she has left the Department of Culture, Media and Sport far behind when the mainstream press finally gets to grips with it.

At the Royal Television Society Cambridge last week, Jowell confirmed that, willing or not, Britain's analogue homes will need to become digital by 2012. The Borders ITV region will be the first to switch over in 2008, and Ulster last four years later.
It is a demanding logistical task involving the overhaul of 1,154 transmitters, the setting up of call centres and coordination with charities and local authorities to help the elderly and disabled. If the process is bungled, it will lead to a public policy car crash for the government. Jowell and the man she has appointed to lead the process, Ford Ennals, will be branded as the people who turned Britain's TV screens blank.

In his first interview in his post, Ennals acknowledges the scale of the challenge and points to his experience as marketing director of Lloyds TSB, where he oversaw a massive merger programme between two previously separate high street brands. "At Lloyds TSB I brought together 17 million customers and 4,500 branches under an integration programme that took five years. It was very complex but it was very successful. In terms of the experience there of overseeing the integration, and at the same time creating a brand, hopefully some of that will be relevant here," he says.

Despite his background, Ennals does not see Digital UK - formerly known as SwitchCo - as a marketing body churning out posters on the benefits of digital TV. It has yet to finalise a budget, but Ennals says early estimates of a £300m kitty are "likely to be too high". Digital UK has wealthy backers, with the BBC, ITV, Channel 4, Channel Five and Teletext among its founders. Whatever the total spend, most of it will be invested in areas such as call centre staff, sending letters to every household in the country and liaising with charities. "This is not about some glossy advertising campaign. This is about providing a service to viewers. There is a very strong public service dimension to what we are doing. This will reach every household in Britain and we need to provide special assistance to those who need it."

Ennals expects that assistance to be one of the most expensive parts of the process. The government has announced a support scheme for the elderly and disabled, to be funded from the BBC licence fee. A trial is under way in Bolton to work out how best to provide that help, but Ennals is less concerned about the cost to a pensioner of buying a set-top box than the difficulty of installing it. "Some people will need some level of installation assistance and that could be a bigger challenge than the issue of affordability."

Ofcom has conducted a laborious research programme and laid down an orderly timetable, so Ennals believes the risks have been minimised. But he admits that such a fundamental shift in how the nation indulges in one of its prime leisure pursuits will attract some criticism: "I am sure that on the way there will be some negative news headlines."

Many of those headlines will be dictated by the success of engineering work on Britain's analogue transmission network, which will be converted mast-by-mast into a web of digital terrestrial transmitters. There are some unknowns in this part of the process, including the need for decent weather - the work must be carried out in the summer- and negotiating with European neighbours about overlaps with international frequencies.

Ennals is keen to lay to rest one engineering myth: that Britain's dilapidated array of rooftop aerials will not be able to pick up a digital terrestrial signal. According to Ofcom and government studies, about 10% of homes might have problems with their aerials, but most now get digital TV through satellite or cable and a "minority" will need to spend more than £100 on an upgrade. Broadcasters are experimenting with an onscreen signal that will tell analogue viewers whether their aerial is picking up the signal effectively, or whether they need to send someone up a ladder.

Ennals is a Sky subscriber - "it's great value for money" - and he is at pains to state that Digital UK will show no favouritism when it explains the options for going digital. The issue of platform neutrality has already caused stress and strain in the great digital coalition. BSkyB, which is not a member of Digital UK, has warned the government that handing the BBC a key role in the switchover process could lead to excessive promotion of Freeview at the expense of cable, satellite and DSL. "We're uncomfortable with the level of compulsion," said James Murdoch, chief executive of BSkyB, on a Cambridge podium last week. In a session characterised by chippy exchanges between panelists that also included BBC director general Mark Thompson and ITV chief executive Charles Allen, Murdoch added: "It is an ultimatum."

Ennals' neutrality argument will be well-rehearsed by 2012, although he admits that digital terrestrial could be the most popular route to switchover. Spectrum Strategy Consultants say Freeview will overtake BSkyB as the biggest digital TV service in 2010."It is likely that there will be more DTT homes than satellite homes if you extrapolate current trends. But a change in proposition for pay satellite, or a change in pricing, can alter things," Ennals says.

As if orchestrating the country's conversion to digital TV is not demanding enough, Ennals, 48, is training for the New York marathon in November. He expects to cross the line in a "sweaty heap", not with arms held aloft in triumph. He foresees the same kind of finale in 2012. "I have done a marathon before and you finish on your hands and knees. But the main thing is that you do your preparation and planning. And that's what this process is about."

Source: Guardian

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rolfw

What he really needs to be doing is putting pressure on the manufacturers to reduce imports of analogue TVs and increasing ID TV manufacture and import, particularly in the portable market, have seen very few if any in the shops, they also need to be a reasonable price.

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Analoguesat

And the moment there is the merest suggestion of an idea that there will be free kit for late adopters the market for boxes and digital tv kit will collapse overnight

rolfw

Not so sure about that, as adopters at the moment are those who have perhaps seen it in friends' or relatives' houses and feel they are missing out, can't see these people waiting until they can get the £30 box for nothing, although I'm sure that there'll be some who will wait.

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Channel Hopper

The spanner in the ointment could well be the confusion generated by the simultaneous release of HD services and the plethora of equipment that will break out into the market in a couple of years time.

The public will have a hard time choosing the correct standards from the various broadcasters advertising tactics.

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BGonaSTICK

Whatever happens, at the 11th hour I'll be hiding all my digital cràpolà in the loft and flogging the free stuff on Ebay the next day!

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w hole

Hello All

What are the chances that by 2012 we will all be getting our content over the Internet anyway?

Banwidth seems to be growing in leaps and bounds.

Look at PodCasting for instance - seem to have a momentum of its own - perhaps its only for the geeky at the moment, but who knows?

Regards

W. Hole

cjgall

Internet is a two way thing thing so I'm not at all happy with the prospect of getting my TV fix over the internet. It will allow commercial channels to gather viewing data on exactly what we are watching. Direct marketing is bad enough but imagine what will happen with the advertisers get there hands on our personal viewing data. It won't only mean an increase in direct marketing phone calls but more acurate ad targeting during the commercial breaks.

BGonaSTICK

Well, whatever the Internet has become by 2012, you can be sure that you'll be able to watch whatever you want over it.

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gameboy

Have you seen the latest Google technology?

Talk about buying dark optical networks to rival microsoft applications over Internet? ...

http://www.searchenginejournal.com/index.php?p=2239

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BGonaSTICK

Hey, that's a very cool article - thanks for sharing.

Man, if only I had the capital to start something like that rolling... that is surely a license to print money.

Google shares look even better value all of a sudden. Dot.com crash2? I'd take a chance on the right thing.

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