Nokia to bring digital TV to mobile phones

By 2006 you will be able to watch television on your Nokia phone. Within two years as many as 20 different TV channels will be made available, Anssi Vanjoki, Nokia's general manager of Multimedia, told the ninth Nokia Mobility Conference, which opened this week in Monaco.

Nokia will introduce a mobile phone with a built-in digital TV receiver by 2006. In Monaco the company revealed its latest model, where a separate TV card is used to make viewing of television possible.

According to Finnish newspaper Helsingin Sanomat Nokia is currently testing the mobile phone TV in Helsinki and Oxford. Testing in the US will soon commence in collaboration with network operator Crown Castle. Nokia recently completed a trial in Berlin, where people could view tv shows on their handsets for three-to-15 minutes per day.

Director Seppo Sutela of Nokia Ventures told the conference that charges on programmes will vary from country to country, but in Germany consumers have expressed a willingness to pay at least €13 per month.

Nokia says it will support the DVB-H standard for mobile phones, but transmission frequencies for mobile TV have not yet been allocated yet.

With its mobile TV phones, Nokia is returning to the television market. In 1996 Nokia sold its (traditional) television production and related technology units in Turku, Finland, along with the machinery and equipment of the Bochum television factory, to a company called Semi-Tech. ®

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