The global market for digital settop boxes is expected to hit 226 million in 2015, up from 205 million this year, but shipments in North America and Europe are expected to decline following the digital transitions in those regions, ABI Research is predicting. Significant growth in shipments to Asia-Pacific, Latin America and Eastern Europe will power much of the global increase, with the digital settop box market for China growing at nearly 10% a year between 2010 and 2015. "Cable boxes decline in the short term due to cable's failure to complete in the North American markets [but] they [will] grow in the long term due to significant numbers of new subscribers in China and to a lesser extent, India," noted ABI Research Senior analyst Sam Rosen in a prepared statement. Digital terrestrial boxes will see the largest growth of any platform. ABI is predicting that DTT box shipments will grow 8.4% a year from 2010 to 2015. In contrast, standard definition DVRS will become a thing of the past in North America and Western Europe, as operations almost exclusively deploy HD capable DVRs.
Source: Broadcasting & Cable, 10/11/2010