Harris delivers IPTV headend to IRIS networks

February 11, 2008 – Harris has announced that IRIS Networks has selected a Harris IPTV headend featuring NetVX MPEG-4/H.264 video encoding for the delivery of standard-definition and high-definition terrestrial TV channels to rural independent telcos in the US.

IRIS Networks is a member-owned organisation based in Nashville and comprising 11 independent telcos in Tennessee, Southern Kentucky and Virginia.  The organisations location in Nashville serves as a centralised distribution point for the delivery of 16 channels of local off-air station programming from Nashville and Knoxville to participating telcos.

The Harris headend installed at IRIS Networks’ location in Nashville includes Harris Videotek DDM-800 ATSC demodulators and NetVX MPEG-2 decoders to receive and decode the TV signals from off-air antennas, and NetVX ENC-A21 MPEG-4/H.264 encoders to compress and transport the multiple standard and high-definition TV channels over a fibre-based backbone to the rural telcos.

“The ability to offer television services to existing and potential subscribers is extremely important for local and regional independent telecommunication companies to compete against larger cable and satellite service providers,” said Peter De Bono, Director of Engineering for IRIS Networks.  “The Harris IPTV headend solution provides a technically superior yet cost-effective solution that allows us to get up and running very quickly with local TV services to ultimately create a more attractive consumer product.  The highly integrated architecture supports our IPTV initiative today with lower total cost of ownership and provides a scalable platform to build on in the future.”