IPTV Under Scrutiny

The Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting has revoked five permits previously issued for providing Internet Protocol television services to private companies.

In late 2015, under its previous head, Mohammad Sarafraz, IRIB offered IPTV permits to five firms who would have now begun operations. At the time, the companies were not named but in a recent report published by Fars News Agency they are listed as follows:

• Irancell: Iran’s second largest mobile telecommunications operator.

• Aseman: A company owned by the Executive Headquarters of Imam’s Directive

• Iseema: An exclusive Internet Protocol television streaming company

• Baran Telecom: A consortium formed by Samsung and two IT companies Fanap ICT Company and Arya Hamrah

• Tarashe Sabz: A consortium established by merging several unnamed Iranian Internet service providers.

In an interview with Fars News Agency published on Oct. 4, Shahab Javanmard, the CEO of Fanap, said IRIB has revoked all five IPTV permits it had issued earlier.

“The newly appointed director of IRIB [Abdolali Askari] has reformed the institution and a new format for IPTV deals are being established,” he said.

The Fanap chief noted that vague regulations have discouraged his company and others from setting up services.

“Changing regulatory laws are a major issue and these obstacles may erode the interest of the foreign and national investors in the market,” he said.

Javanmard further said that after revoking the licenses, IRIB has allowed the original companies to continue to serve the existing customers. He also said the companies will be at the front of the line when the new licenses are issued.  

 Tender and Other Issues

Previously, in an interview with Peyvast Magazine in September 2015, Keyvvan Jamebozorg, CEO of Baran Telecom, claimed that his company offered “21 trillion rials” ($5 billion) to IRIB when they originally issued the tenders for the licenses.

In the same interview, Jamebozorg said IRIB officials announced that the High Council of Cyberspace has declared IRIB to be in charge of regulating IPTV services.

“IRIB has reached an agreement with both the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology and the Ministry of Culture, and they have recognized IRIB’s claim on this sector,” he said.

“Telecommunications Company of Iran and Baran Telecom were negotiating a deal, which have been halted due to structural changes in TCI.”

Later in October 2015, the Telecoms Ministry announced that IRIB is not authorized to license IPTV.

Telecoms Minister Mahmoud Vaezi was quoted as saying by the local media, “IRIB can only regulate the content of its own programs and providing services such as IPTV and Internet Protocol media is beyond its purview.”

Vaezi said this is because such services are dependent on communication networks, hence such a license can only be issued by the ministry.

“However, at that time, the permits were not revoked and the companies started providing services,” he said.

The ongoing issues between the national broadcaster and the commercial companies come at a time when President Hassan Rouhani’s administration is looking to boost the industry in terms of investment.

It also points to the changing broadcast landscape in the country, as the Internet plays an ever more important role with companies chasing a younger generation of viewers who opt to view online on the back of global trends.

IPTV delivers television services using the Internet Protocol suite over a packet-switched network such as LAN or the Internet, instead of being delivered through traditional terrestrial, satellite signal and cable television formats.

Unlike downloaded media, IPTV offers the ability to stream the media in smaller batches, directly from the source. As a result, a client media player can begin playing the data (such as a movie) before the entire file has been transmitted. This is known as streaming media.