ABI: Revenues Shift from CAS to DRM

The broadcast pay TV sector, composed of cable, satellite, and terrestrial offerings, uses two distinct forms of content protection. Traditional conditional access systems (CAS) protect broadcast content to set-top boxes, as well as some additional content such as VOD, while digital rights management (DRM) technologies are used to protect content being delivered to multi-screen devices, including tablets, smartphones, and connected TVs.

According to ABI Research’s report, “Conditional Access and Digital Rights Management for Pay TV Markets," the worldwide market for pay TV CAS and DRM will grow at a relatively modest 15 percent from $2.2 billion in 2011 to $2.5 billion in 2016. However, there is a significant shift from revenues derived from traditional CAS systems to revenues coming from DRM technologies; DRM constitutes 47 percent of the market in 2011 but grows to 59 percent in 2016.

Leading worldwide CAS vendors based on number of managed boxes include Nagra, NDS and Motorola. China Digital TV has recently passed Cisco for the fourth position based on strong digitization of Asian cable platforms. In the DRM space, Google’s Widevine and Microsoft’s PlayReady and Silverlight lead the market.

“Traditional CAS vendors are working hard to adapt their solutions for Telco’s IPTV platforms as well as protecting content to multiple screens," said Sam Rosen, ABI senior analyst/Digital Home, in a statement. "NDS just announced their VideoGuard Connect solution in order to deliver DRM technologies to their CAS customers, rather than lose them to third parties. Motorola acquired SecureMedia last year for similar reasons. If Google integrates Widevine DRM with Motorola MediaCipher and markets it to operators successfully, they would have a complete and very competitive solution.”