Microsoft has notched up another win for its Mediaroom IPTV platform--with United Arab Emirates telco, du. The latter announced Wednesday that, on July 1st, it launched a Mediaroom-powered IPTV service, called du TV+, that offers HDTV, instant channel-change, an "ergonomically designed" seven-day EPG, and the ability to pause, rewind and record live programming. The service is available to customers in areas covered by du's fixed-line network, and the company says that it will migrate existing customers of its du home service to du TV+ in a phased manner, by swapping out their du TV decoders, starting August 15th. The upgrade will be carried out free-of-charge, the company says. "du has collaborated with Microsoft to bring a new dimension to TV viewing in the UAE," Farid Faraidooni, du's EVP of commercial, said in a prepared statement. "Our state-of-the-art offering includes features like intuitive channel search and display, advanced browsing and high-definition TV. HD channels from du are available to all new du customers at no extra charge until 31 July, 2009. du will introduce its commercial HD packages in August 2009. Over the past several months, du has been working with leading channel providers to bring high-definition content into the UAE. As more channels become available, du will progressively add more HD content to its TV offering. All du customers will have access to unparalleled picture and sound quality."
