The ECCA Annual Meeting, 2006.

ECCA - The European Cable Communications Association ECCA is the trade association for European cable operators. It holds an annual meeting, in a different European city each year, which is a combination of AGM, conference, exhibition and social gathering. SCTE President, Dr. Roger Blakeway, attended the 2006 congress which finished on 1st March and sent this report.

Mike Fries of Liberty Global	Introduction This years 52nd ECCA Congress was held in Vienna at the end of March. The bitterly cold weather did not deter more than 600 senior executives from the cable industry attending the three-day event. The delegates represented a broad cross-section of the European and the global Cable industry - from Network Operators and Service Providers to Content Suppliers, Equipment Manufactures, Vendors, Software and Services providers. Unsurprising perhaps that 76% of those attending were from Western Europe with Eastern Europe contributing 11%. A particular feature of the ECCA Congress is the seniority of attendees; ECCA give the breakdown as President/Vice President/CEO/Chair/MD at 36%, CTOs, Directors, Senior Sales/ Business Development/ Technical/ Marketing/ Commercial etc at over 40%. Of course, the event also coincides with the Annual General meeting of ECCA so the presence of senior MSO personnel is not too surprising but it is gratifying to see how many participate in the panels and general sessions.

ECCA Business Matters ECCA announced the appointment of Manuel Cubero, MD of Kable Deutschland as its new President with Bernard Cottin stepping down to become vice president. There is also a new executive team at ECCA with Caroline van Weede as Managing Director, Niels-Kristian Hersoug as the new MD of EuroCableLabs (taking over from Chuck Carroll who will continue as liaison officer for ECL with CableLabs in the US) and Toon Diegenant as Head of Communication. At a press conference Manuel Cubero confirmed that ECCA would still concentrate its efforts on lobbying the Commission on regulatory and other issues; Caroline van Weede’s previous experience being especially valuable. He also announced the setting up of two new workgroups to complement the Regulatory Workgroup; a Content Workgroup and a Communications Workgroup. Within EuroCableLabs a Concept Lab is being established alongside the existing specification and certification activities; this will research emerging broadband technologies, identify key strands and provide inclusive liaison with other market players. When questioned about the work on a common Set Top Box specification, Cubero admitted that it had been difficult to find a common denominator and worj was still ongoing; the fact that the EU had declined to issue a mandate was a key decision.		Manuel Cubero, new President of ECCA

The SA stand in the exhibition	The Conference Within the Conference sessions IPTV loomed large as this years ‘big bad wolf’. Mike Fries, CEO of Liberty Global, in his opening address called for a level playing field for cable operators as they face unprecedented competition from incumbent telcos. He said MSOs had difficulty competing effectively if regulators blocked mergers and acquisitions. Liberty felt that decisions about exiting some markets would have to be taken if they could not reach a 30% share. On the positive side, however, he thought that the looming threat of IPTV was over-exaggerated. He believed they are going to find the provision of video services tough going from both a Quality of Service viewpoint and on Content Rights Management. He professed that "I am not overly worried, so long as they are rational," meaning that predatory pricing on video to protect voice telephony and exclusivity deals on content might cause problems and in the end become a regulatory issue. Strangely, at the Press Conference, there seemed to be little knowledge about the capacity of telcos to provide anything other than a ‘broadcast’ TV service. Whilst the local loop issues are well known, the capacity of the core network to carry the enormous bandwidth of VOD has received little ‘industrial espionage’ from the cable community. This year’s surprise contribution from ntl (last year it was using ADSL on the copper overlay network for the final drop) was to announce trials of Ethernet over Coax as a means of delivering the estimated 35MB/s that we will all need and reducing the costs of deploying DOCIS 3 equipment in the early stages of role-out.

The Exhibition In the Exhibition there were some 40 exhibitors; an eclectic mix of hardware, software and programme providers. Motorola, Nortel, Philips and Scientific-Atlanta demonstrated "state-of-the-art" cable living rooms.		Motorola's cable living room

Time for a little relaxation.	Social & Extra Curricular Activities As usual the social events organised by ECCA were well worth attending, a Gala Dinner at the magnificent Town Hall complete with Mozart, ballet and pop rap was complimented by a Cocktail reception at the Museum for Applied Art. Most delegates seemed to find the whole experience worthwhile and the ECCA Congress continues to grow year by year. Rumour has it that they may be heading towards the UK next year, watch this space.

ECCA 2005 and 2004 Reports from previous ECCA meetings are still on the site. The ECCA 2005 report is here. The ECCA 2004 report is here.		Teleste's stand
© Society of Cable Telecommunication Engineers.