July 20, 2021

HbbTV releases Targeted Advertising solution for TV sets in set-top box markets

Geneva, July 20, 2021 – The HbbTV Association, a global initiative dedicated to providing open standards for advanced interactive TV services through broadcast and broadband networks to connected TV sets and set-top boxes, is pleased to announce the publication of the second phase of its solution for Targeted Advertising (TA). This enables substitution of broadcast adverts with targeted adverts in situations where the broadcast TV signal is received by a set-top box (STB) and passed to the HbbTV TV set via a connection such as HDMI.

The HbbTV Application Discovery Over Broadband (ADB) specification already defines how broadcasters can add signalling to video and audio which survives the HDMI connection and can be used by a TV set to launch an HbbTV app. This specification has now been updated to enable broadcaster apps to use the HbbTV TA API to schedule a precise switch from HDMI to an advert and back again when the TV set is connected via a STB.

The combination of ADB and TA will enable broadcasters to reach more of their audience with targeted advertising, and also to offer targeted inventories to advertisers in a homogeneous manner – two aspects which are very important to preserve revenues and realise new growth opportunities in the face of competition from other advertising categories and chiefly from the native digital inventories such as web and mobile.

HbbTV’s work on Targeted Advertising has been done in cooperation with the DVB Project. DVB developed the original requirements and their own related specifications for signalling when broadcast adverts can be replaced. Both HbbTV ADB and DVB TA employ the ATSC 3.0 video and audio watermark solutions to enable signalling to survive carriage over an HDMI connection.

“The release of the TA solution for STB markets is a perfect example of how HbbTV adjusts its specifications to the needs of industry players, enabling them to adjust to real market circumstances and grow their business through new revenue sources,” said Vincent Grivet, Chair of the HbbTV Association.