"State Grid" network integration will eventually unify the wired network

On February 13, the General Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television issued a notice to accelerate the implementation of the pilot program for the integration and development of the nationwide cable television network (Xinguang Power Generation [2015] No. 29).
The notice mentioned that China Radio and TV Network Co., Ltd. should earnestly play a good role in the pilot work of the national integrated development of the cable television network, which means that the national network of radio and television "State Grid" as the main national network integration is expected to enter the substantive promotion phase.


State Grid Corporation was established last year after four years of brewing. When possible, the competent department gave the strongest lineup of the leadership team: Zhao Jingchun as Chairman, Liang Xiaotao as General Manager, Zeng Qingjun, Yu Baoan, and Lu Jianjie as deputy general managers.

The establishment of the company means that the national cable operators finally have a unified organization. This shows that in the development of triple play, the broadcast and television network has taken a substantial first step - with the market players, it is possible to start real market competition.

After the establishment of the “State Grid” company, it will serve as the main body for the nationwide cable network integration, promote the nationwide cable network integration on the basis of provincial network integration, and grow into the fourth largest operator in China.

The bad news is: When the State Grid is actually operating, it is still necessary to solve the most central problem first, a nationwide decentralized network. Radio and television network can only achieve the "interconnection and interconnection" by completing the integration of the "national network", and then achieve the goal of "cross-screen cross-domain inter-network".

Under the current framework, it is difficult for the State Grid to integrate the national radio and television cable network, because it is directly facing the local network companies that have long been “arriving by the land”. According to the data, the total assets of the national cable television network is estimated to be approximately 150 billion yuan and the net assets are more than 700 billion yuan. The State Grid Corporation has acquired the cable network assets of 34 provinces in the energy range of 4.5 billion yuan registered capital. Obviously not realistic.

If administrative intervention is used, and it is inconsistent with the principle of marketization, and because there is a large amount of social capital in wired assets around the country, the corporate nature of Radio and TV Networks determines that the implementation of asset allocation is not realistic.

“The cable industry is very complicated. There are already several cable TV listed companies, and some internet companies are brewing for listing. These companies have strong enough strength and, involving listed companies, policy integration will be more difficult.” Tell "exclusive radio and television."

In fact, even if China Radio and TV Network Company has sufficient funds and resources, whether Radio and TV Cable Network Company is willing to cooperate with the transfer of assets is also a problem. “The broadcasting and TV market is not completely market-oriented, which makes network integration not only a question of money, but also multiple considerations such as status and administrative level,” said the industry insider.

The good news is that there are only 10 to 20 broadcasting and TV companies in the province or sub-provincial units in the country, some of which are listed companies. This means that the integration targets faced by the State Grid have been greatly reduced, and the agreement also means that the new round of integration in the future will be mainly market-based, and more will be capital's “you love me”.

At the business level, the State Grid launched the first shot to expand its business last year and signed a framework agreement with the Shaanxi Broadcasting Network at the end of the year to build a data center framework for the China Broadcasting and Television Network in the Xianyang New District. The two parties will cooperate to build a content exchange center (CDN) and IP. The backbone nodes of the switching center and related platforms, and the commercial operation of cloud services for television program exchanges and data exchanges in commercial service operations.


However, whether the State Grid will use it as a pilot to carry out integration work is still unknown. This can be either a physical level integration of local networks or a variety of platforms at the business and technology level.

On February 26, at the mobilization video teleconference of “Broadband China” 2015 organized by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, Zhao Jingchun, chairman of State Grid, disclosed that at present, China National Broadcasting Corporation has conducted a national cable television network interconnection platform technology. Program design, preparation of feasibility study report, key technology pre-research, and site selection for equipment room. This year, we will start and complete the first phase of a nationwide cable TV network interconnection and interworking platform including IP exchange, content distribution network, radio and television cloud distribution, and broadcasting and broadcast control services, covering the front end of provincial cable TV networks in the country.

Zhao Jingchun also revealed that it will take the responsibility of accelerating the pilot program for the nationwide development of cable television network integration and the idea of ​​"integrating and reforming borderline," and assumes the main responsibility for the pilot development of the nationwide cable television network integration. It will actively carry out network integration pilots and gradually establish National Cable Network Unified Operation Management System.

According to the relevant person in charge of the General Administration of State, the State Grid currently faces several key tasks:

1. Network interconnection and interworking: The backbone network and the local distribution networks are physically connected;
2. Technology interoperability: Uniform technical standards, distribution of scheduling cross-domain services;
3, business interconnection: each program and various industry content cross-domain transmission;
4. Operational interoperability: unified settlement of cross-domain services and sharing of interest in the industrial chain;
5. Management interconnection: Unified management of network services to ensure content security.