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–Secures Additional MediaHighway Deployment with CanalDigitaal

Interactive TV and conditional access technology provider, NDS, has launched an ITV betting platform on the satellite TV system of its News Corp.-stablemate, Sky Italia. The company claims that it is the first such platform to launch in the Italian market. The platform allows Sky Italia customers to use their remotes to place bets on a range of sports through Italian bookmakers, Snai and Italbet, provided that they already have accounts with those companies. Once they have selected which of the two bookmakers they want to handle their bet, the platform offers them a range of bets, all of which are updated in real time.

NDS says that it developed custom technology infrastructure and tools for the deployment. The platform is directly linked to each bookmaker’s backend system, from which it converts relevant data into a broadcast signal that is sent to users’ set-tops through Sky Italia’s satellite network. The data resides in the set-top, where it is updated in real time and displayed through a navigation system that allows users to view all the available bets in a categorized menu. When a user places a bet, the information is encrypted and sent securely through a phone line back to the bookmaker; the user, meanwhile, receives a confirmation "receipt" on the TV screen. "We are very pleased to be partnering with Sky Italia on an industry first in Italy," Jesper Knutsson, NDS’s VP of interactive TV, said in a prepared statement. "Our middleware provides a very intuitive and attractive user experience, giving Sky Italia’s customers a full range of sports bets that are normally only available through a betting shop or online. This should open the market to more casual betters, who may not otherwise have participated in these activities. In addition to the ease of use, the strong encryption and parental control features make it a very safe offering for consumers."

NDS has also launched (in time, of course, for the 2006 World Cup) two new soccer-themed interactive TV games on Sky Italia: "Kick-Off" and "Goleador." "Kick-Off" presents players with a free kick scenario in which opponents and team mates are displayed on the screen. Players have the option of passing the ball to a team mate or of attempting to score a goal themselves, and the game features a series of stages, each more difficult than the last. The games can be reskinned to reflect ongoing soccer tournaments: during the World Cup, for example, players’ teams are kitted out in Italy’s national uniforms, while the opposing teams are dressed in the uniforms of whichever national team Italy is facing at the time. In "Goleador," meanwhile, players receive a pass from one of their team mates and must then kick or "head" the ball into the goal, in order to score points. The game also features a succession of increasingly difficult levels, with higher-speed passes and more difficult angles and positions. Sky Italia customers can play both games for €1.50 per day.

In other NDS news: the company says that Dutch satellite TV provider, CanalDigitaal, is integrating its MediaHighway middleware into new set-top boxes which will be deployed in Belgium’s Flanders region (i.e. the northern part of Belgium, where Flemish, a language closely related to Dutch, is spoken). CanalDigitaal will begin distributing the new MediaHighway-equipped set-tops in the coming weeks: the middleware will allow its subscribers to access its new, Flemish-language DTV service, TV Vlaanderen. NDS says that MediaHighway will also allow CanalDigitaal to operate multiple TV "bouquets" going forward, through its scanning technology, which provides viewers with customized EPG’s that display channel listings specifically for the content they have subscribed to. CanalDigitaal also employs MediaHighway on its existing set-top boxes in the Netherlands. "We are impressed with the flexibility of NDS’s middleware solutions as they support our operation of different TV bouquets across several countries," CanalDigitaal COO, Kees Farber, said in a prepared statement. "This has enabled us to incorporate the same middleware into our new set-top boxes in northern Belgium that we already use in the Netherlands. Thanks to the multiple scanning management technology of MediaHighway, subscribers are provided with the TV services according to their country-specific viewing privileges."

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