Freeview unveils Freeview Playback brand

20 April 2007

Freeview, the free-to-air digital TV service, is introducing Freeview Playback – its digital TV recorder brand – later this month.

Unlike some other digital TV recorders on the market, Freeview Playback is subscription-free and will offer one-touch recording, pause and rewind live TV and series recording.

Freeview Playback products from Humax, Sony and TVonics will be available from retailers including Comet, John Lewis, Argos and Tesco. Alba, LG and Sharp, amongst others, will also introduce Freeview Playback digital TV recorders later this year.

Anyone who purchases a Freeview Playback recorder will get access to Freeview’s suite of free-to-air channels, including the major terrestrial broadcasters as well as ITV2, E4, Film4, CBeebies and BBC Three.

Freeview believes it is now on the main TV set in some 8.2 million homes in the UK, according to data supplied by Gfk. Based on the data, Freeview estimates that this puts it ahead of each of the individual pay-TV providers for the first time.

There have been 1.7 million Freeview sales this quarter, consisting of 947,000 boxes and 738,000 iDTVs. Of the 1.7 million sales, 500,000 of these are for primary sets in the UK.

In terms of sales, quarter four of 2006 saw strong Freeview sales across all products, including digital boxes, digital TVs and digital TV recorders – where sales doubled year-on-year.

Freeview is targeting 10 million sales of Freeview Playback recorders by 2012, many of these replacing the analogue VCRs that are already in the marketplace.


Freeview unveils Freeview Playback brand	Back
20 April 2007 Freeview, the free-to-air digital TV service, is introducing Freeview Playback – its digital TV recorder brand – later this month. Unlike some other digital TV recorders on the market, Freeview Playback is subscription-free and will offer one-touch recording, pause and rewind live TV and series recording. Freeview Playback products from Humax, Sony and TVonics will be available from retailers including Comet, John Lewis, Argos and Tesco. Alba, LG and Sharp, amongst others, will also introduce Freeview Playback digital TV recorders later this year. Anyone who purchases a Freeview Playback recorder will get access to Freeview’s suite of free-to-air channels, including the major terrestrial broadcasters as well as ITV2, E4, Film4, CBeebies and BBC Three. Freeview believes it is now on the main TV set in some 8.2 million homes in the UK, according to data supplied by Gfk. Based on the data, Freeview estimates that this puts it ahead of each of the individual pay-TV providers for the first time. There have been 1.7 million Freeview sales this quarter, consisting of 947,000 boxes and 738,000 iDTVs. Of the 1.7 million sales, 500,000 of these are for primary sets in the UK. In terms of sales, quarter four of 2006 saw strong Freeview sales across all products, including digital boxes, digital TVs and digital TV recorders – where sales doubled year-on-year. Freeview is targeting 10 million sales of Freeview Playback recorders by 2012, many of these replacing the analogue VCRs that are already in the marketplace.