The ITU will take the lead in international standardisation for IPTV with the creation of a Focus Group on IPTV (IPTV FG). The announcement follows an agreement reached at a public consultation meeting held on 4 and 5 April where around 120 experts from the world's leading ICT companies backed up ITU's role in the coordination of global IPTV standards. The decision was made because of the benefits of worldwide standards for all players in the IPTV value chain and the need to achieve rapid progress to avoid market fragmentation. The first meeting of this group will be held in early June 2006. The announcement, while acknowledging that standards work is ongoing in many different places, including ITU, is a reaction to an industry call for ITU to push forward and coordinate global standardisation effort in the field.

IPTV is a system where a digital television service is delivered to consumers using internet protocol over a broadband connection. It will help pave the way for players, many of whom are already moving to IP-based NGN infrastructure, to offer a triple-play of video, voice and data. Standards are necessary in order to give service providers, whether traditional broadcasters, ISPs or telecommunication service providers, control over their platforms and their offerings. Standards here will encourage innovation, help mask the complexity of services, guarantee quality of service (QoS), ensure interoperability and ultimately help players remain competitive. The mission of IPTV FG is to coordinate and promote the development of global IPTV standards taking into account the existing work of the ITU study groups as well as other standards development organisations (SDOs), forums and consortiums. In particular, the IPTV FG will:

1. Define IPTV 
 - Identify scenarios, drivers and relationships with other services and networks
 - Identify requirements and define framework architecture
2. Review and gap analysis of existing standards and ongoing works
 - Identify opportunities for ITU
 - Identify activities that ITU would encourage other organisations to pursue
3. Coordinate existing standardisation activities
4. Harmonise the development of new standards
5. Encourage interoperability with existing systems where possible
www.itu.int/ITU-T/IPTV/