It was business as usual at BroadcastAsia2009 and CommunicAsia2009 this week as 54,354 attendees congregated at Asia's largest media and infocom trade event. Of the total number of attendees, 49 percent came from outside of Singapore, hailing from about 100 countries and regions across Asia-Pacific, Europe, US and the Middle-East.

Spanning 58,000 square metres, the exhibitions featured 1,923 exhibiting companies from 60 countries and regions. The shows saw a total of 34 group pavilions, with countries like Belgium, Brunei Darussalam and Vietnam participating for the very first time. Over four days at the BroadcastAsia International Conference, eight dedicated programmes were carried forward with key issues like how to embrace and engage the future of the broadcasting business, realizing the ever more opportunities of IPTV, learning how to expand the opportunities of radio and how to monetize and protect existing content, mobile multimedia application platforms to explore new mobile TV markets, how the new media shifts to a new dimension and discussed the emerging innovations that will set the industry forward.

Exhibitors were pleased with the event, citing the opportunity to network and discuss business deals with high quality visitors as the key reason. BroadcastAsia2009 and CommunicAsia2009 is clearly the most important platform in the Asia Pacific region for the industry to launch products, make announcements and network. "We are encouraged by the positive feedback from exhibitors. 80 percent of exhibitors have already indicated that they will be participating in the shows in 2010", said Stephen Tan, Chief Executive of show organiser, Singapore Exhibition Services.

Exhibit profiles

• Transmitter & receiver - products, systems, services (88)
• Satellite/Microwave/Telecommunications equipment & systems (72)
• Immersive Technologies (72)
• Set-top box/Encoders/Decoders (60)
• IPTV/Streaming media/Web casting (57)
• Audio Production/ Post-Production Products & Services (57)
• Broadcast-to-Handheld/DTV/ HDTV/DMB/DVB (55)
• Cable (55)
• Video on Demand/Interactive TV (53)
• Consoles & mixers (52)

Quality customers

Long time exhibitor of the show, Panasonic, was pleased with the business opportunities made at BroadcastAsia2009. Panasonic Systems Asia Pacific's Assistant General Manager for its Broadcast Regional Operation Centre, Max Khang said, "This year celebrates our 10th year at BroadcastAsia. SES had gone the extra mile to create more potential client interaction opportunities for Panasonic, creating an unexpected increase in sales revenue for us."

Panasonic's success at the show was fuelled by their full High-Definition (HD) 3D mini-theatre. The HD 3D 10-minute movie saw a constant string of viewers throughout the four days, and had many people talking about 3D in HD broadcasting as the new frontier.

The spotlight was on the Singapore Pavilion at BroadcastAsia. With more than 20 local companies taking part for the first time, interactive digital media was one of the main features. One such project is "Wish Singapore", developed by PGK Media. Making its debut at this year's National Day, the gigantic floating LED cylindrical display will feature Singaporeans' well wishes at Marina Bay.

IPTV in the spotlight at BroadcastAsia2009 International Conference

A hot topic at the conference this year is IPTV. Although IPTV is not a new idea, the challenge now is reinventing it into a more compelling feature. The day long discussions, chaired by David Wood, Head of Emerging Media at the European Broadcasting Union, talked about the technical issues surrounding IPTV, and business opportunities such as how IPTV can differentiate itself from other TV services.

The session also looked at how advertising revenues can be derived from operating an IPTV service. Participants at the IPTV session explored the possibility of combining IPTV's Video-on-demand features with internet features such as social networking sites and virtual sites. The topic of discussion was also whether this would be successful, as participants also felt that internet-based content often lack the right business models.

Worldwide and regional launches at CommunicAsia2009

This year, crowds at CommunicAsia were treated to a range of new launches, including the latest mobile devices from the industry's market leaders. At the show, LG unveiled its Crystal GD900, the world's first transparent phone, while Samsung introduced its next era of smartphones in a worldwide launch. The highly-anticipated, new Samsung Jet supports the latest smartphone features which include multi-task manager and Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync, bringing user-friendly menu navigations in a sleek and compact design. Garmin and ASUS also leveraged on CommunicAsia's high profile to launch its first ever collaboration, the Garmin-ASUS nuvifones G60, a smartphone with location based capabilities.

With green revolution taking centre stage this year, CommunicAsia saw over 40 companies showcasing their green solutions. Indian vendor VNL took this opportunity to launch the world's first 100 percent solar-powered GSM base station while companies such as ZTE and Samsung introduced handsets made from recycled materials.

"CommunicAsia provided the perfect platform for the Broadband Forum to promote the strength and progress of the broadband subscriber growth worldwide.  It also gave us the opportunity to meet and educate an influential level of executives throughout Asia" said Robin Mersh, Chief Operating Officer of the global consortium.  The Broadband Forum announced the latest broadband statistics, which showed Asia leading the way with broadband connections, jumping by a third compared to 4 percent growth globally.