Ericsson Friday said it is introducing a client software that enables easy channel surfing for mobile television. The new channel selector offers quick channel switching and easy access to a list of available channels.

Ericsson said that as mobile TV is quickly becoming an important subscriber service, this facilitates operators to generate new revenues in addition to existing services. Mobile operators and media companies all over the world are introducing Mobile TV services, in form of schedule based TV channels as well as on-demand TV programs, it said.

The handset can be used similar to how channels are switched with a remote control.

When switching to a new channel via the Ericsson Mobile TV client the channel is visible on the mobile screen in less than three seconds. The Mobile TV client that Ericsson provides is a white label client that can be customized to represent the service provider's brand.

The Ericsson Mobile TV solution enables operators an end-to-end solution utilizing the mobile networks, WCDMA and GSM/EDGE, for commercial Mobile TV services.

Mobile networks are currently distributing Mobile TV via unicast. As Mobile TV becomes a mass-market service the mobile networks will have broadcast capabilities referred to as Multimedia Broadcast Multicast Services, or MBMS, available.