Hong Kong Broadband Network (HKBN) is gearing up for rapid growth in residential fixed-line broadband subscribers across the city as it rolls out more over-the-top (OTT) streaming video services from major partners.
“In my view, OTT players will replace the existing pay-television operators in Hong Kong within the next three to five years because they offer more choices and package content on a video-on-demand basis for consumers,” HKBN chief executive William Yeung Chu-kwong told the South China Morning Post. “Our cooperation with OTT players will help us get closer to our target of 1 million broadband subscribers.”
That anticipated disruption in the local pay-TV industry augurs well for HKBN, the city’s biggest provider of residential high-speed fixed-line broadband service as it competes against i-Cable Communications and media mogul Richard Li Tzar-kai’s PCCW-owned HKT and NowTV operations.
“Unlike those other broadband network operators, we don’t offer our own content to compete against the OTT players,” Yeung said.
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In addition, HKBN provides an extensive fibre-optic infrastructure across the city that supports so-called 4K ultra-high-definition TV services. Its residential customers have fixed-line network connection speeds from 100 megabits per second to 1 gigabit per second.