Ofcom said on Friday that it expects TV delivered by ADSL "to become more significant" this year.

The regulator made its prediction despite the impending closure of Kingston Interactive Television in Hull; however, KIT was only taken up by 4,200 homes out of a possible 105,000.

The current major DSL TV operator, HomeChoice, reported 34,000 subscribers as of September 2005 and now passes 2.4m homes in London.

Ofcom bases its prediction on the growing takeup of broadband services, the continuing expansion of ADSL availability across the country, the gradual adoption of MPEG-4, the reduction in access charges to BT's local loop, and "reductions in computer processing and memory costs." Among the companies planning to enter the DSL TV market in some form during 2006 are BT (via a box delivering both DTT and IPTV services) and Sky (offering VOD and interactive services using the access it now has through the recently-acquired Easynet).

"The availability of additional TV content via broadband will give large numbers of consumers the opportunity to equip their TVs with these new hybrid broadcast and broadband devices," concluded Ofcom.