Development of China's digital television market looks like it will be a slow process as the government has rejected all five proposed sets of broadcasting standards it has received to date - a move that will have a large effect on the potentially huge market.

Four research groups from around the country have submitted proposed standards to the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television and the State Development Planning Commission -- the two bodies responsible for digital TV transmission in the country -- but they have all been rejected due to "technical flaws," a researcher involved in the project told Shanghai Daily.

"Tests on the five blueprints were conducted at the end of last year. But the results were unsatisfactory," said Zheng Shibao, a professor at Shanghai Jiao Tong University.

The research groups, which come from Beijing's Tsinghua University, Jiao Tong University, the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China in Chengdu and the SARFT's Academy of Broadcasting Science, are working quickly to revise their proposals as the country will pick a winning plan by the end of this year.

"Though each has injected a huge amount of investment, the winning bid will earn considerable financial returns by collecting patent fees," said Liu Wei, a Shanghai Planning Commission official.

Hoping to capitalize on the lucrative market of 370-million-plus color televisions on the mainland, Jiao Tong has invested about 100 million yuan on the research while Tsinghua has spent more than 80 million yuan.

China has decided not to use digital transmission standards already in use abroad as Chinese broadcasters and TV manufacturers would have to pay royalties to foreign companies.

Using domestically developed technology will also make it tougher for foreign firms to dominate China's digital TV market as they would have to use Chinese technology and pay royalties to the winning bidder.

While the government has ruled out using foreign standards, a laboratory was established last year to test digital transmission standards used in Japan, North America and Europe.

"All the three formats will affect China's own standard in different ways," said Zheng. "But we will not copy overseas standards in a bid to protect our local digital TV industry."

Currently, a pilot broadcasting system for digital television is in operation in Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen.

Shanghai currently sends digital television signals to some local residential areas on a trial basis via the city's cable network. Families involved in the trial are using a set-top box to decode signals.

Shanghai is also pushing forward the two-way transmission of digital television signals, under which users can order programs at home. The project is not proceeding smoothly, however.

Previously scheduled to kick off last July, the project has been delayed for almost a year.

"Equipment for the launch of two-way transmission of digital signals are well in place, but there still remain some problems," said Li Dehao, an official of Shanghai government's information technology development division. But he declined to divulge more details.

By 2005, digital TV signals will be transmitted to a quarter of the TV stations on the mainland, according to China's industrial blueprint.

Currently, analog TV signals are transmitted in China. The digital signals will provide higher quality pictures, reception and sound. Digital signals are also easy to record and copy.

"Although we have made some progress in digital transmission of TV signals in Shanghai, the city will not end analog TV broadcasting until at least 2005," Zheng said.

The shift to digital broadcasting could mean huge profits for both domestic and foreign TV set manufacturers.

(eastday.com June 1, 2002)