The Department of Communications has announced new standards for digital television set-top boxes which will provide millions of South African households with Internet access for the first time.

The new STB decoder standard, known as SANS862:2012 announced in conjunction with the SA Bureau of Standards, provides for a “return path” functionality which will enable broadband access for households. There are not details as yet on the quality of the broadband service in terms of bandwidth, latency and contention, but expect more about this as HDTV becomes a reality for South African households.

The new revised STB decoder standard includes a USB port and will deliver similar functionality to that of cable and wifi.

Medialternatives raised the issue of Internet via Digital Terrestrial Television (DTT) back in 2008. You can read the posting here.

The new standards are bound to impact on South Africa’s domestic electronics industry, as major players jockey for position in the award of tenders.

The Democratic Alliance has criticised the new digital strategy of government subsidised decoders for being “Dead on Arrival”, since according to the party, the “decoder can be more cheaply manufactured overseas.”

DA MP Marian Shinn said in March that the demand for the set-top boxes had a limited lifespan and that local manufacturers would therefore not create long-term employment.

The opposition party has obviously not done its homework, since the new standard is a real boost for local electronics manufacturing, providing a baseline for subsidised consumers who are bound to demand further value-added technologies.

The South African Communications Forum (SACF) applauded the move, congratulating Minister Dina Pule, and this blog can only concur — at last common sense has prevailed with a triple reward — digital television is going to benefit local industry, Internet service providers will see a boost from value-added services in particular web-hosting, as the consumer benefits from an increase in Internet access options .

Tag: SABS