HOWZAT

Several Hollywood studios have signed deals with the big American and European telecommunications companies, such as BT and France Telecom.

This has led to the launch of multi-media centres that bundle personal computers and television sets together to deliver downloadable films, books and music. Sony and Microsoft are among the companies offering these.

3 Hand-helds go hybrid

Makers of hand-held gadgets are rushing to exploit online entertainment. While 2004 has been about multifunctionality, expect 2005 to see the arrival of products aimed at more specific markets. Portable DVD players will soon come equipped with wireless connectivity, while several manufacturers are working on a laptop/hand-held hybrid — Sony, Panasonic and Samsung among them.

At the smaller end of the scale, the phone/camera/MP3 player market will spawn further creations. These will deliver new services, such as live sports, full-length movies and video-conferencing, though what they show will depend on the size of their screens.

4 Games without frontiers

Microsoft’s Halo 2 computer game was a $45m first-day blockbuster, outselling some of the biggest Hollywood movies last year. Little surprise then that the battle for supremacy in the online games market will intensify this year.

For the first time, the British market will reach a critical broadband mass that will enable games providers to develop real-time interactive adventures that will pit player against player, team against team. This will provide a great fillip for Britain’s games industry, formerly a world-beater but more recently under pressure from stiff Japanese and American competition.

The influence of Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft, which dominate PC games consoles, will undoubtedly increase in the coming year.

5 Internet telephony

If there is one sure thing for 2005, it is the rise of that awkward acronym Voip (voice over internet protocol), or more simply, telephone calls over the internet.

Voip will be a revolution in the telecoms market. At its basic level, internet telephony involves the breaking down of voice calls, in the same way that data are dismantled for online contact, to be sent over the internet and then reassembled at the receiver’s end. Data calls have no way of being billed — thus making Voip free. Established telecoms groups will lose business and need to find new sources of revenue.