China could soon lead the world's broadband Internet industry, but operators need to first step up efforts to develop broadband content, an industry veteran said.

"The beauty of China is it doesn't have the old (broadband Internet) technologies in place that Europe and American do," said Tom Costello, vice-president of Chicago-based International Engineering Consortium (IEC).

"Consequently, China can lead the technology and bring (broadband Internet) services to the people that help improve life, in terms of education, quality of life and business. It is a huge market with great potential."

Because China has no burden of legacy technologies, it has been the front-runner in adopting the latest broadband Internet technology.

However, with broadband penetration increasing, Chinese operators need to pay more attention to developing broadband content, which will become future cash cow, said Costello, who has 31 years' experience in the global telecom industry working at a number of companies such as Samsung, SBC and AT&T.

"As traditional telecom companies continue to make successful, aggressive advancements towards integrating interactive and entertainment content to their service offerings, content is becoming more and more of a priority for them," he said.

On June 5-8, IEC and Chinese fixed-line carrier China Netcom will co-host the Broadband World Forum Asia 2007 with broadband content set to become a focus of discussions.

It's first time for the forum, a major event in the broadband industry, will be held on the Chinese mainland. Previous events were held in South Korea, Japan and Hong Kong.

Costello said the broadband content market has been largely untapped while billing, content licensing, social networking, gaming, DRM (digital rights management) and user-generated content offer lucrative opportunities.

"There is indeed a significant amount of revenue to generate from content offerings," he said.

In China, operators have generated most revenues from broadband Internet access instead of content. Now they are starting to identify the broadband content as a new revenue stream.

China Netcom now operates Cncmax, a portal website focusing on broadband content offerings such as video streaming and video on demands.

"We are generating an increasing amount of revenue from the broadband content offerings," said Zuo Feng, head of Netcom's broadband Internet business.

"And we are bundling the broadband access and content offerings, which will generate huge business opportunities."

Zuo said Netcom is considering offering downloads of high-definition films, which could help woo broadband subscribers.

"We are talking with (film) copyright holders and hope to launch the services soon," he said.

(China Daily May 17, 2007)