iTV first interactive channel in Poland...

By Aleksander Nowacki

Interactive television has not won itself a good reputation in most developed countries, as the first attempts made by U.S. and western European companies at developing it shared the fate of other overly ambitious high-tech endeavors in the wake of the bursting of the IT bubble. Yet there are enough domestic firms adventurous enough to try their hand in the field.

The first interactive channel in the central and eastern European region, iTV, was launched in mid-June by broadcaster Telestar. Currently reaching just less than a million households, with Cyfra+ digital platform users accounting for some two-thirds of them and Aster City cable network subscribers making up the rest, the channel has already proved to be a success, say its owners.

"The failure of the first ventures in interactive TV was due to their use of extremely expensive technologies," said Leszek Kułak, Telestar's management board proxy holder responsible for the channel. "We are much less ambitious. Interactivity in our case does not mean that all content can be individualized."

Kułak said that the planned investment in the enterprise stands at around zł. 3.5 million in its initial period, and that "so far, we have been running on budget." The capital has been put forward by software integrator Media Net Interactive and by Legion Polska, which are equal co-owners of Telestar. The required technology is already in place and any investment that might still be made would be to develop new formats of interactive TV. Kułak does not rule out the possibility of seeking outside investors for that purpose at some point in the future.

Although the prime source of revenue is meant to come from text messages and phone calls associated with the interactive TV channel, the company might also look for advertising and sponsorship deals.

"We have a lot of experience as an added services integrator," Kułak said. "The channel is the crowning of a long process. We know how to produce quizzes, competitions and games that consumers would be interested in paying for."

With viewers encouraged to phone in with comments and questions or to send premium-rate text messages, Kułak said that the channel would offer a unique way for advertisers to get consumers directly involved with an advertised product. The channel could be used to promote and sell financial and insurance products, Kułak said. Commercial messages could also be sent directly to viewers' mobile phones.

For now, however, there is no advertising on iTV and banks have not reacted to the suggested opportunities with enthusiasm.

A marketing officer at a major retail bank, who declined to be named, said that the company was already using the Internet as a channel of communication with customers, but he did not see advertising on interactive media as a viable alternative to the more traditional forms in the near future. He also said that sales of banking products through TV and telecom technology would be a technological challenge and that the trials undertaken in more developed countries had not produced encouraging results thus far. He added, though, that the option of having direct, real-time contact with viewers would be an attractive proposition, as it would allow for "an immediate evaluation of the impact of the specific message."

iTV is currently in talks with cable operators to have the free-to-air product introduced to more TV provider networks. Telestar's plans are for the channel to reach between 2.5 million and 3 million households across the land by the end of the year.

Despite still being well short of the target, the company is happy with the results it has achieved so far. "We have received communications from several tens of thousands of viewers," Kułak said. "We can already say it's been a success."