Boston, MA - 22 May 2007 - According to the latest research from Strategy Analytics, pay TV in Central and Eastern Europe is just as likely to be offered by telcos as by cable or satellite TV providers, unlike regions where the traditional platforms dominate the landscape. This report, IPTV: Eastern Europe Offers Fertile Ground for Advanced Telco Services, examines the emerging IPTV competitive landscape in Russia, Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary and other countries in the Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) region, and concludes that millions of households across Eastern Europe are now able to choose an IPTV provider as an alternative to cable or satellite.

"The absence of entrenched and well established pay TV providers, such as cable and satellite operators, means that telco IPTV services will face much less competition than in most other developed regions," comments Martin Olausson, Director of Digital Media Research at Strategy Analytics. "Telco IPTV in the CEE region will therefore likely develop into a much stronger TV platform, with a larger share of viewers relative to cable and satellite, than in most other regions."

"The emerging markets of `New Europe' are beginning to offer fertile ground for managed IPTV services from incumbent telcos and competitors alike," adds David Mercer, Principal Analyst at Strategy Analytics. "A few new service providers are even leapfrogging many of their Western European neighbors by moving straight to Fiber-To-The-Home (FTTH) solutions that easily cope with the technical demands of IPTV."