Exclusive Belinda Gannaway Tesco.com chief executive John Browett has ruled out digital interactive TV as a medium for its store based home shopping service. Speaking exclusively to The Grocer he said: "There are clearly roles for all these things going forward. But there are particular platform issues on DiTV that would make it very difficult to do our very broad product offer. The way it actually works in terms of servers in the stores means that technically it's quite difficult for us to go on a digital TV platform. "We've got various development efforts to think about it and look at it, but we haven't found it that attractive." Asda and Iceland have both committed to TV based home shopping services. And Sainsbury has confirmed that it is going onto DiTV. But Browett raised doubts about the consumer take-up of a food offer on digital TV. "We've not yet been convinced the consumer uptake is going to be there for the type of services we offer. Probably for non food but not for the food areas." He has also raised some scepticism about the role WAP technology ­ internet enabled phones ­ will play in the Tesco strategy. As with DiTV "the platform owners in the UK are pretty aggressive about what they want in terms of percentage revenues etc. It makes it hard for the economics to stack up." Sainsbury and Waitrose both have WAP services. By the end of the year Tesco.com will have 90% coverage for its grocery service. On top of groceries, books, entertainment, home and baby and toddler, more categories will be added. Browett said: "There is no limit to the number of categories we can bring to the internet business and that's very much the strategy; to become a place where you can buy everything you'd want to buy on the internet." {{NEWS }}

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