Drivers and barriers to digital television adoption in Portugal: The perspectives of the TV viewers and other main stakeholders

The main goal of the ADOPT-DTV project is to understand what are the most significant factors for the adoption of digital TV by the Portuguese population in the switchover context. On the 26th of April 2012, the analogue terrestrial television switchoff is planned to occur in Portugal, according to the schedule published by the national telecommunication regulator Anacom. Digital terrestrial TV was launched in the country in April 2009, turning Portugal into one of the countries with the most ambitious schedule - or risky, depending on the perspective - for the full transition from analogue to digital terrestrial television. We will start by presenting the objectives, theoretical framework and research design of the ADOPT-DTV project. Next, we will present the first results of the project focused on the barriers and drivers for the adoption of digital TV from two of the empirical studies which integrate it, namely, the quantitative inquiry applied to a representative sample of the Portuguese population and interviews with the main stakeholders in the digital TV area in Portugal. The perspectives of the television viewers are compared with other main stakeholders in this process. A brief discussion of these results and a brief enumeration of the next steps for the project will conclude this paper.