Digital Home industry analyst Michael Inouye says, “ABI Research estimates that worldwide pay-TV subscriber numbers will surpass 719 million by the end of 2010 as novel solutions such as Google TV move from trial to commercial launch.”

Super-fast Internet has allowed advanced services and significant innovations in recent years. Also recently, Google announced the development of a new television delivery platform: Google TV will offer a television viewing experience enhanced by the web and its main feature will allow users to have a complete Internet experience along with their favorite TV content on their living room televisions.

Dish Network in the USA has already started a Google TV trial, where users have a Google TV set-top box to pull the content from any cable or satellite provider. This set-top box is based on the Android platform and it uses Intel’s Atom CE4100 processor.

“Google TV will be very much a competitor to Apple TV which offers a similar service. Apple TV, however, can only access content that is available from the iTunes Store,” says research associate Khin Sandi Lynn.

“Google TV will be hoping to fare better. Its additional versatility should be more attractive to regular television viewers.”

In 2009, the Asia Pacific region took the lion’s share of the global pay-TV market with its 363 million subscribers. While cable TV is the major pay-TV platform, inroads are being made by telco TV providers and Asia-Pacific telco TV growth is expected to gain pace. ABI Research estimates that APAC will attain a 31% share of the global telco TV market in 2010.

The study is a part of the company’s Digital Media research service, which includes other market data products, research reports, research briefs, ABI insights and analyst inquiry support.