Pay TV info. : 2014

Wednesday, December 24, 2014

MultiChoice grows DTT footprint

Naspers has reported an increase of 342,000 households across its African pay-TV business in the first half.

The company, which operates under the MultiChoice brand, now has services available in 873,000 households. Around 1.2 million subscribers have a PVR.

The segment reported a revenue increase of 18% year over year to reach R20.2 billion and delivering a profit of R5 billion.

MultiChoice now runs DTT services in 11 countries and Naspers in now looking towards further analogue switch offs to further grow the business.

“The second half of the year is traditionally the most active part of the year for most of our businesses. We expect some pick-up in spend as we capitalise on the holiday season, which could result in lower core headline earnings for that period,” cautioned CFO, Basil Sgourdos. “Our goal remains to develop online classifieds, etail and DTT to deliver future growth and create value over time,” he added.

Local content hubs are being developed in Nigeria and Kenya; and additional transponder capacity has recently been purchased from Eutelsat and Intelsat.

Russia plans for digital future

The services distributed by Russia’s first DTT multiplex are now available to 82.8% of the population, according to Alexei Volin, the deputy minister of communications and mass media minister.

Quoted by ComNews andAKTR, he added that audience growth this year amounted to 4.9%. He also said that 60% of the population could benefit from broadband services and receive HDTV.

These statistics come against the backdrop of last week’s approval of a bill on the distribution of channels in Russia. Drafted by the Ministry of Communications, it will now be considered at a meeting of the Cabinet.

The proposed bill introduces the concept of mandatory public TV channels and categorises them as All-Russian, essential digital services on multiplexes, regional and municipal. It also establishes particular regional and municipal mandatory public channels, with the list of these channels determined by the Russian government.
Meanwhile, the Russian president will determine the operators of DTT multiplexes.

Although the proposed bill has been welcomed by the Russian Television and Radio Broadcasting Network (RTRS), it has come in for criticism from the National Association of Broadcasters (NAT).

Foxconn India Employees protest Against Plant Shutdown

Image via Shutterstock.

Foxconn India employees gathered outside the company premises on Monday to protest against the management’s decision to quit India.

The Taiwan-based contract manufacturer has announced that it is closing its Chennai plant on December, 24. The device maker said that closure of Nokia plant has forced it to halt its India operations.

Foxconn plant closure will leave 1,700 people without employment. The company management, State Labor department and trade union have already held tripartite meetings over settlement issues. The meetings remain inconclusive and the workers say that they will continue to protest management’s decision.

“We have been told that plant will suspend operations from December 22 instead of December 24. We will not give up. We will go to the plant everyday even if they ask us to go home. If they ask us to leave, we will not hesitate to go for protest,” Foxconn India Employees Union President, E Muthu Kumar told Press Trust of India.

According to the Union, Nokia Siemens Networks and Sony also use Foxconn products. Management cannot suspend operations just because Nokia suspended their production”, Kumar added.

Foxconn’s decision to move out of Chennai came as a surprise. On December, 10, the Economic Times had reported that the Taiwan-based company was planning to buy Nokia’s factory and will be investing as much as $2 billion in India operations. Just three days later, Foxconn announced that it is, in fact, shutting down production.

Indian device makers- Micromax as well as Lava- have also reportedly shown interest in buying Nokia’s Chennai assets. The Finland-based company was unable to offload the plant to Microsoft due to its tax tussle with the IT department.

The exit of two major companies in the Nokia SEZ area hasn’t deterred other factories from expanding in the region. Recently, Salcomp- a company that makes mobile phone accessories- has taken the space that was earlier allotted to US-headquartered Laird Technologies.

Wednesday, December 17, 2014

Ukraine sets out digital plan

Ukraine National Council for Television and Radio

A working group created by the Ukrainian regulator National Council has published recommendations on the country’s transition to digital broadcasting.

In its view, the process should be undertaken in four stages, with the first, completed in June 15, 2015, seeing analogue signals switched off in 10 locations including the capital, Kiev.

This would be followed by five more locations switching off at the end of next year, eight more on June 30, 2016 and finally two locations – Lugansk and Donetsk – at the end of 2016.

The group listened to proposals about a pilot project in Kiev and talked about the need for a broad information campaign and the issue of set-top boxes.

Its recommendations will now be considered by the National Council.

Raduga TV/MTS plans revealed

Russia’s MTS will take subscribers of the now closed DTH platform Raduga TV up until the end of March 2015.

Quoted by ComNews, Anatoly Sosnovsky, a board member at Raduga Holdings, added that MTS would provide Raduga TV subscribers with all terrestrial channels they were previously offered, along with a further free 25 channels.

What will happen after March 31 still remains to be decided. MTS’ actions do not amount to a takeover of Raduga TV.

Furthermore, Sosnovsky said that MTS’ offer was the best one that had been received by Raduga TV.

An agreement between the two parties was signed shortly after the closure of MTG-backed Raduga TV earlier this month.

MTS has also recently launched its own DTH platform.

Dialog Television revenue raises by 29% in Q3 2014

Sri Lankan telco, Dialog Axiata, has reported 29% increase in its revenue from its direct-to-home service, Dialog Television (DTV), in the third quarter 2014. Pay-TV revenue has increased to LKR3,405 million (USD25.9 million) in the third quarter 2014 from LKR2,637 million (USD20.1 million) in the third quarter 2013.

The operator’s pay television subscriber base reaches 410,000 at the end of September 2014 from 285,000 subscribers at the end of September 2013. There has been a growth rate of 36% year-on-year.

DTV’s post-paid and pre-paid DTH subscribers grew by 22% and 286% y-o-y respectively, said the company in its financial statement.

Friday, December 12, 2014

1.9 connected TV devices per broadband household in USA

Average Connected TV Devices per Broadband Household in USA reaches 1.9 in Q3 2014

New Strategy Analytics Quarterly Tracker Finds 43 Percent of Connected TV Devices In Use are Games Consoles but Smart TVs, Standalone Media Streamers Catching Up

BOSTON — Ownership of Connected TV Devices (including smart TVs, smart blu-ray players, IP-enabled game consoles and digital media streamers) grew 5 percent quarter-on-quarter in Q3 2014 and 28 percent year-on-year to reach 168 million units. Fuelled by a desire to watch video content delivered via the open Internet, the average US home now owns 1.9 Connected TV devices compared to 1.5 in Q3 2013 according to Strategy Analytics’ Connected Home Devices (CHD) service report, “USA Connected TV Device Tracker: Q3 2014″.

Other key findings from the report include:

Sony led the US IP Games Console market for the third consecutive quarter capturing just under 50 percent of unit shipments in Q3. Microsoft claims the largest installed base of all three console vendors though with close to 30 million Xbox’s in use in the country.
Samsung is the dominant player in the US Smart TV market claiming 35 percent share of units shipments during the third quarter. Vizio was second followed by Sony and LG.
Apple slipped to third in the Digital Media Streamer market in Q3 2014 having led the market just 12 months previously. Google’s Chromecast took top spot with 26 percent share of shipments followed closely by Roku.

David Watkins, Service Director, Connected Home Devices commented: “Competition within the US Connected TV Device market is intensifying as device makers battle to be the gateway of choice for watching online videos on the TV screen. Heavyweight brands Google and Amazon have shaken up the market and have created a huge surge in demand for low-cost media streaming dongles. These devices may not provide as sophisticated an experience as an integrated Smart TV but often provide a much faster and easier way for consumers to get access to their favorite online streaming service”.

Eric Smith, Analyst, Connected Home Devices said: “The Connected TV device market today is characterized by proprietary platforms but the market of tomorrow may well come to be defined by open source operating systems. Google’s Android TV platform has been set loose, LG is replacing its platform with WebOS and the first Tizen supported Smart TVs are expected to emerge in 2015 from Samsung. Such openness of standards may well be the key to unleashing the true capabilities of Connected TV”.

Airtel Digital TV launches application for TV

Airtel Digital TV has introduced an exclusive application for television. The TV application is a replica of the ‘My Airtel mobile application’.

The application helps users with an Airtel Digital TV high definition set-top-box to access Airtel Digital TV account details real-time on television sets. To access it, users have to connect the STB to an internet connection.

Airtel has also launched Infinity Wi-Fi TV dongle which is priced at INR849 for HD set-top-boxes. The device is compatible with HD, HD+ and HD-DVR STBs.

New Russian cable rules emerge

A Russian government committee has approved a proposal by the Ministry of Communications clarifying the business model to be used cable operators.

Under it, reportsKommersant, the latter will be prohibited from charging their subscribers for terrestrial (FTA) channels.

Furthermore, they will not be allowed to create regional versions of channels with their own programming without having first signed a contract with those channels.

An advertising ban on non-terrestrial channels will come into effect in Russia at the beginning of next year.

Operators of such channels are expected to raise their distribution fees to make up for shortfalls in their revenues.

MTS makes pay-TV gains

MTS and its daughter MGTS have become the third leading provider of fixed-line pay-TV services in Moscow, pushing VimpelCom back into fourth place.

According to Vedomosti and TelecomDaily, MTS/MGTS ended the third quarter with 210,000 subscribers, or 8,000 more than VimpelCom, compared to 185,000 and 198,000 three months earlier. T

his turnaround is attributed to MGTS’ GPON fibre-optic network, which began to actively connect subscribers in the summer of 2013 but has only seen significant demand for fixed services such as pay-TV since this summer.

Although Rostelecom and Akado remain the leading providers of fixed-line pay-TV services in Moscow, with 3.24 million and 1.02 million subscribers as of the third quarter, MTS is becoming an increasingly important player in the Russian pay-TV market as a whole.

It recently launched its own DTH platform and took over the subscriber base of MTG-backed Raduga TV, which ceased operating earlier this month.

Swiss SRG to close down SD satellite distribution

Switzerland’s public radio and television broadcaster SRG SSR will transmit its TV channels solely in high definition (HD) via satellite in future.

The standard definition (SD) satellite distribution will be terminated on February 29, 2016. The affected channels are SRF 1, SRF zwei, SRF info, RTS Un, RTS Deux, RSI LA 1 and RSI LA 2.

The SRG channels have been simulcast in SD and HD format via satellite since February 29, 2012. Only SRF info is currently just offered in SD resolution. From March 2015, the information channel will also be provided in HD quality.

The majority of Swiss TV households already receive HD television, according to SRG SSR. Almost 15% of Swiss TV households have opted for DTH satellite reception.

SRG SSR uses Eutelsat’s Hot Bird satellite system at 13° East for its satellite distribution. The signals are encrypted in Viaccess for copyright reasons. Smartcards are only issued to Swiss citizens.

Thursday, December 11, 2014

Karnataka govt plans to launch its own cable network soon

The Karnataka state government plans to enter the cable television network services and considers launching its own service in the next two-three months, provided that the union government gives its nod, as per Roshan Baig, state information minister.

“The private cable operators have been exploiting customers by charging as much as INR 400 (USD 6.46) per month, stating that they would provide over 500 channels. However, the public does not have time to surf through all the channels. Hence I intend to bring down the cable fee to INR 100 (USD 1.62) on par with the service in Tamil Nadu and provide reasonably good service through the state government’s own cable network,” said Baig.

The government, in September this year, had demanded cable operators to reduce monthly subscription fees to INR 100 within two months. The ministry now plans to hold talks with Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) and union ministry for communications and information technology. The private cable operators have, however, opposed the move stating that TRAI guidelines do not permit state government to own a cable network.

Germany's primacom selects Conax revenue security for cable TV

primacom selects Conax revenue security for cable TV growth in Germany

Conax Contego™ unified security back-end provides primacom with a rock solid, highly reliable and scalable foundation for future growth, including easy expansion for additional business models

BERLIN — Conax, part of the Kudelski Group (SIX:KUD.S) and a leader in total service protection for pay-for-media, content owners and entertainment services, today announced it is providing primacom, one of Germany’s largest cable TV providers, with content revenue protection for its growing DVB cable and pay-TV network. Based in Leipzig, primacom has deployed the flexible Conax Contego™ unified security back-end to deliver total service protection and streamlined services for its operations nationwide. Conax Contego™ provides enhanced content security architecture for increased scalability and flexible service delivery.

The flexible Conax Contego™ content security platform will illustrate the key role of a unified security solution for forward thinking pay-TV operator, primacom. The Conax technology will protect primacom’s existing DVB cable network while providing both a scalable foundation for growth and the flexibility to continually enrich the service offering. Multiscreen, multi-network and Over-the-Top content delivery packages can be seamlessly integrated with the broadcast offering to create a unified user experience.

primacom provides high-end telecommunications and cable TV services to more than 1.2 million connected households, making primacom the fourth-largest cable network operator in Germany. Active in the multimedia and telecom markets since 1998, primacom is well-established in the German telecommunications market as a nationwide provider with a regional focus, delivering high-end digital TV, HDTV, digital program packages as well as high speed internet access, and modern telephony solutions to end-consumers.

Ludwig Modra, Chief Technology Officer, primacom, “primacom is committed to providing its customers with seamless access to the services and content they desire. We chose security partner Conax and Conax technology based on its long experience, proven track record and reliability – enhancing our consumer commitment. Deploying Conax Contego™ enables primacom to deliver a smooth and intuitive user experience and also provides us with the flexibility needed to satisfy future customer demands beyond our managed network, while also seamlessly protecting our existing network configuration.”

Thomas Blichfeldt, VP EMEA Sales, Conax, “primacom is experiencing strong growth – Conax is delighted to be chosen to collaborate with the primacom team on the deployment of their conditional access solution to support their future platform expansion. The flexible Conax Contego™ security back-end is well-suited to protect primacom’s highly popular service offerings. Highly scalable and modular Conax Contego™ technology will enable primacom to easily align their security coverage beyond a managed network to include DRM and secure delivery of premium content to a multitude of devices when they are ready to integrate new Multiscreen and Over the Top (OTT) services.”

The Conax Contego™ universal security hub ensures secure video delivery across a broad range of networks and device types, providing flexibility in selection of security evaluated client devices, seamless middleware interoperability and proven scalability. Based on 25 years of experience, today Conax is the security partner of choice for 400 operators in 85 countries.

Cable operators in Delhi set up an industry association

Cable operators in Delhi have joined hands to establish the Cable Operators Welfare Federation. At present, over 16 registered associations of Delhi cable operators are part of the Federation.

The association aims to protect the interest of the smaller last mile cable operators (LMO). It also intends to ensure that government does not ignore LMOs while implementing digital addressable system. AS Kohli from west Delhi is the Chairman and Surjeet Singh is the President of the newly formed association.

The federation is likely to send a memorandum to information and broadcasting minister, Arun Jaitley, seeking a common tariff by the multi-system operators in Delhi, as per a media report. Furthermore, the memorandum is expected to point out that while the MSOs receive carriage fee, the LCOs should also get a share of this. It would also emphasis that LCOs should also be paid a share by broadcasters of pay channels who are earning huge revenue through advertisements.

Romanian pay-TV penetration nears 90%

Romania ended the first half of this year with 6.6 million subscribers to pay-TV services, a 5.4% increase on the same period in 2013, according to data published by the regulator ANCOM.

As a result, the penetration of pay-TV services was 89%, a figure Broadband TV News believes to be one of the highest in Central and Eastern Europe.

Cable remains the most popular method of watching pay-TV services in Romania, with the number of homes at the end of June being 4.21 million, up almost 6% on a year. It was followed by DTH (2.37 million, +4%) and IPTV (65,000, +42%).

Most subscribers were in urban areas (61%, with almost 80% of these being cable).

In rural areas, DTH accounted for 62.3% of all pay-TV subscribers.

Most pay-TV subscribers (over 4 million, up 9% year-on-year) opted for digital services, with the breakdown of digital reception being 59% DTH, 39% cable and 2% IPTV.

Although the number of cable homes receiving digital services increased by 16% in the year to June 30, they still accounted for less than half (1.6 million) of the cable total.

Wednesday, December 10, 2014

Tricolor TV ownership discussion resumes

The Russian press has restarted a debate about the ownership of Tricolor TV, the country’s leading DTH platform.

According to Kommersantand Comnews, Andrey Tkachenko, the president of the GS Group, has been named as the chairman of the board of director of the National Satellite Company (NSK), the operator of Tricolor TV.

GS Group is a major supplier of reception equipment to Tricolor TV and market participants have long believed Andrey Tkachenko to be one of the platform’s owners.

However, this was and continues to be denied by GS Group.

Meanwhile, NSK maintain the platform is owned by physical persons and VTB Capital.

Tricolor TV is Russia’s leading provider of pay-TV services, with a market share of around 29%.

Tuesday, December 9, 2014

TDC eyes Sweden’s Com Hem

Swedish cablenet Com Hem has become the latest cable operator to attract a suitor from the telecoms sector.

It has emerged that the company, currently in the hands of private equity firm BC Partners, has been in talks with Danish telco TDC since last June – before Com Hem went public.

When news of the potential tie up emerged over the weekend shares in Com Hem rose by an initial 9%.

TDC already owns the Norwegian cable operator GET, purchased in September from GS Capital Partners and Quadrangle Capital Partners for NOK 13.8bn (€1.79bn), as well as its own YouSee cable operation in Denmark.

The Swedish cablenet now has 22% of its installed base connected to the TiVo set-top platform. Its seen an increase of 30,000 over the third quarter to reach 132,000 customers. The subscriber base as a whole has grown by 15,000 to 861,000.

MTS secures Raduga subscribers

MTS is to take over the subscriber base of Raduga TV, the Modern Times Group (MTG)-backed Russian DTH platform that ceased broadcasting on December 5.

Quoting a source close to Raduga TV and confirmed by MTS spokesman Dmitry Solodovnikov, Tass and Comnews report that the two parties plan to sign an agreement today (December 9).

Further details of the transfer are expected to be announced shortly.

Raduga TV was launched in 2009 and covered over 90% of Russia.

It was the country’s fourth largest DTH platform as of Q2 this year and attracted interest from a number of companies, most recently MTS, before its closure.

MTS has just launched its own DTH platform and aims to become the second leading provider of satellite services in Russia after Tricolor TV within three years.

CCTV acquires broadcast rights for Olympic 2018-2024

Chinese public broadcaster, China Central Television (CCTV), has extended its association with the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to acquire broadcast rights for the XXIII Olympic Winter Games in PyeongChang in 2018, the Games of the XXXII Olympiad in Tokyo in 2020, the Olympic Games in 2022 and 2024.

The agreement also includes the right to broadcast all editions of the Youth Olympic Games until 2024. The IOC has an existing agreement with CCTV to broadcast the Rio 2016 Olympic Games. CCTV has exclusive rights across all broadcast platforms including free-to-air television, pay TV, internet and mobile TV.

“The revenue the IOC has secured from this agreement will be redistributed to support future organizers of the Olympic Games, as well as supporting sport and athletes in China and around the world,” said Thomas Bach, President of IOC.

“This is a win-win agreement. CCTV has been contributing enormously for the recognition and promotion of the Olympic Games and the Olympic Movement in China and we are determined to be, as always, a powerful and exceptional partner of the IOC,” said Hu Zhanfan, President of CCTV

Thursday, December 4, 2014

Orange TV seeks more Romanian subs

Orange is making a big push to attract more subscribers to its DTH service in Romania.

According to ZF, Orange TV, which was launched in 2013 and currently has over 110,000 subscribers – equivalent to around 5% of the country’s total DTH market – is being offered free of charge for seven months to customers who sign two-year contracts.

Its monthly subscription fees range between €5 and €16, with the monthly rental for a decoder being €2.50.

Orange’s new campaign is aimed specifically at its mobile customers and those willing to sign a mobile contract.

They are exempt from activation and installation fees, each amounting to €20.

New OTT service for Russia

T2 RTC Holding, a joint venture between Tele2 Russia and Rostelecom, has launched a new OTT service in partnership with SPB TV.

According to AKTR andComnews, it is delivered by 3G and accessible on Android mobile devices, with those employing iOS and Windows Phone due to be added in the near future.

Tele2 TV offers over 60 Russian and foreign TV channels and will cost R7 (€0.12 ) a day from December 12, with all new users being offered the service free of charge for the first three days.

The take-up of Tele2 TV is likely to increase significantly in 2015, when Tele2 plans to launch high-speed 3/4G mobile internet services in more than 50 regions of Russia.

There are already close to 3 million mobile TV users in Russia, with the number expected to double to 6 million, or 4% of all mobile subscribers, by 2016.

All three leading mobile operators – MTS, MegaFon and VimpelCom – already include mobile TV as part of their offers.

Emerging markets drive satellite pay-TV growth

The global satellite pay-TV industry has observed strong growth in the past five years despite an increasingly competitive TV landscape where IPTV, DTT and connected entertainment services have rapidly expanded their reach.

Subscriptions to satellite pay-TV reached 196 million homes in 2013 and revenues topped $97 billion, according to Euroconsult’s new report Satellite Pay-TV: Key Economics & Prospects.

While key performance indicators of the sector continued to grow, a slight slowdown was observed, largely attributable to the lack of dynamism in mature markets. Emerging markets now account for 60% of global subscribers, as well as nearly 100% of subscription growth.

In the past five years, emerging markets have been the most active in rolling out new platforms, increasing subscriber bases, growing revenues and adding TV channels. They have also reduced the technical gap with mature markets’ platforms in terms of value-added services rolled out. “Emerging markets are home to over 80% of the nearly 160 active platforms,” said Dimitri Buchs, consultant at Euroconsult and editor of the report.

“Over 95% of platforms launched in the past three years operate in these markets.” The share of revenues coming from emerging markets is lower due to the large availability of low-cost services in these countries, but it has also increased in recent years, from 15% in 2008 to 26% in 2013.

Apart from new platform launches, a growing trend in emerging markets has been the expansion into new markets for existing players; this has been particularly true in Sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America. The launch of 60 platforms in the past five years has led to an oversupply in certain emerging markets including Indonesia which had the highest number of active players in November 2014.

Several large, fast-growing satellite pay-TV markets – Russia and Brazil – began to consolidate in 2014 following a slowdown in growth over the last several years. Despite this recent M&A acceleration, new projects should continue to rollout in the short term, mainly in the fastest-growing markets. Future projects should also target new markets, with Bangladesh expected to be one of the next satellite pay-TV countries.

Given the progressive change in video offers and the rapidly evolving pay-TV landscape, the recently observed trend should continue, with several of the largest mature markets including the U.S., France and Japan expected to see a contraction in satellite subscribers, revenues and number of TV channels broadcast. In mature and advanced emerging markets, the competitive environment will increasingly lead to an adaptation of business models and service offerings.

Satellite pay-TV platforms will increasingly expand their ecosystems to become cross-media platforms by rolling out TV Everywhere and OTT services in parallel to their linear TV offerings, enabling them to maintain a strong foothold in their national/regional markets. Decreasing satellite KPIs will push a growing number of platforms to find new sources of revenue and expand their reach outside their satellite subscriber base. This has already begun with several satellite pay-TV platforms rolling out standalone OTT services available to households not subscribing to their linear packages.

Emerging markets should account for nearly 100% of growth in subscriptions, revenues and number of TV channels by 2023. Global subscriptions should reach 340 million in 2023; emerging markets should account for nearly 80% of the total, with Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa expected to be the fastest-growing regions.

ubscriptions will be largely supported by the greater availability of low-cost offerings. Nearly 30,000 channels should be distributed in 2023, with growth favored by the take-off of HD in emerging markets and rollout of the 1st UltraHD channels.

Wednesday, December 3, 2014

Russia's Raduga TV to close down

Raduga TV to close down, Viasat Russia to launch 5 new HD channels

The Russian digital satellite TV platform Raduga TV will stop its broadcasting services on 5 December 2014, as it has not been granted the required broadcasting license from the local media regulator. MTG will continue to enhance the content and technology of its Russian pay-TV channel business Viasat, and will launch five new HD channels in 2015.

MTG has owned 50% of Raduga Holdings S. A., the principal owner of LLC DalGeoCom, which operates Raduga TV, since February 2010. Raduga TV launched in February 2009 and has offered a wide range of Russian and international channels all across Russia.

“This has been a very difficult decision taken with the other shareholder, given the impact it will have on employees, customers, suppliers, and all of the other stakeholders of the business. Over the past year Raduga has worked very hard exploring all options for obtaining the right license, which despite their efforts has not been granted. We therefore have no choice but to close down the operations. We are working hard to move our subscribers to another satellite operator and will make an announcement by December 6.”

“The decision does not affect our successful pay-TV channel business Viasat, were we will launch five new HD channels in 2015. Viasat offers 15 channels in Russia, five of which are among the country’s 20 most popular channels.”

Irina Gofman, EVP/CEO of Russia & CIS and Pay-TV Emerging Markets

The value of MTG’s participation in Raduga Holdings S. A. was written down 100% in February 2014, and accordingly MTG’s Q4 2013 results included a SEK 147m non-cash and non-recurring impairment charge in the Group’s operating income. The decision was based on the ongoing uncertainty and lack of visibility surrounding the licensing status and requirements for Raduga TV. The adjustment in satellite subscriber numbers for Pay-TV Emerging Markets will be accounted for in MTG’s 2014 Q4 results.

GS Group launches STB based on custom processor

Russia’s GS Group has announced the launch of a new set-top box (STB) to support the upgrade of Tricolor TV customers to high definition (HD). The GS B211 features a new satellite tuner to improve reception reliability, and is based on a System-in-Package IC, SiP Amber S2, developed by sister company GS Nanotech.

Tricolor TV launched its trade-in program for old set-top boxes in May 2014, using an earlier generation set-top box from GS – the GS B210. To date 600,000 have taken part in the scheme. The B211 will be made available for exchange starting in December, with an expectation that 150,000 will be delivered in 2014 and 1.5 million in 2015.

New DTT tender in Romania

The Romanian regulator ANCOM has launched a tender for two national, as well as 40 regional and 19 local DTT multiplexes.

In a statement, it says that it has it has done so – the two national multiplexes were previously allocated – in order to ensure the transition to digital broadcasting is completed by June 17, 2015.

All the licences will be valid for a period of 10 years, with winners allowed to offer commercial services from after June 17, 2015.

Winners of the two national multiplexes will be required to have at least 36 transmitters up and running by May 1, 2017, while regional and local licence winners will be required to have at least one transmitter in their coverage area.

Minimum licence fees have been set at €300,000 for each of the national multiplexes, €12,000 for the Bucharest regional multiplex and €1,000 for local licences.

The results of the tender will be known by the end of January 2015.

Portugal grows pay-TV

Portugal added another 46,500 pay-TV subscribers in the third quarter, taking the installed base to over three million.

As of September 30, 2013 there were 3.29 million subscribers, according to the regulator Anacom.

The growth came principally from IPTV-delivered services with a 6.8% increase on the previous quarter. The number of cable television distribution service subscribers fell by 0.8% over the same period.

As at the end of September, the cable TV distribution service represented 41.8% of all subscribers while xDSL represented 22.4% and DTH 18%. Optical fibre (FTTH/B) represented 17.8% of total subscribers and is the technology that has seen most growth.

Grupo NOS reported the highest share of pay-TV subscribers (44.5%). followed by PTC, Vodafone and Cabovisão with shares of 42.1%, 6.7% and 6.5% respectively. Vodafone was the provider that added the largest number of subscribers in net terms during the quarter, making it the third largest provider of this service.

Across the board there was a 1.6% drop in the number of subscribers taking premium channels.

Pay-TV subscriber base reaches 6.90mn in Karnataka as of June 2014

Pay television market in Karnataka has an overall subscriber base of 6.90 million at the end of June 2014, as per an estimated report by Dataxis. There has been a meagre growth rate of 0.90% quarter-on-quarter. The research firm has reported that Karnataka has over 2.5 million digital cable pay television subscribers and 4.46 million analogue cable television subscribers at the end of June 2014.

Den Networks Karnataka, IMCL Karnataka, Hathway Karnataka and ACT Karnataka are the leading players in terms of pay-TV subscribers in the state. Den, IMCL, Hathway and ACT’s total subscribers in the pay-TV market stood at 2.5 million, 1.36 million, 900,000 and 452,000 subscribers at the end of June 2014.

Den Networks Karnataka has added over 50,000 subscribers in the second quarter 2014 to its overall pay-TV market. Its digital cable pay-TV and analogue cable TV subscribers stood at 2.5 million and 450,000 respectively at the end of June 2014. IMCL Karnataka, Hathway Karnataka and ACT Karnataka have added over 30,000, 40,000 and 30,000 pay-TV subscribers respectively to its overall pay-TV market in the Q2 2014.

Monday, December 1, 2014

Forthnet tops 0.5m pay-TV subs

Forthnet ended the third quarter with 504,441 subscribers to its pay-TV services in Greece, or 20.2% more than in the same period last year.

Its triple play customer total meanwhile stood at 355,862, a 41.3% increase on a year earlier.

Total subscriptions stood at 1,177,651 (+14.4%), with the number of unique households being 821,789 (+5.7%).

Forthnet’s revenues in Q3 amounted to €91,865,0000, down by 2.5% on the same period last year, while its adjusted EBITDA was €15,587,000 (-2.2%).

The company notes that the rollout of triple-play services is expected to be the main driver for the pay-TV market in the future.

Commenting on the results, Panos Papadopoulos, the company’s CEO, said: “Forthnet is proving its resilience to the negative trends the domestic telecommunication sector faces and it continues to outperform the market. Our differentiated strategy allows us to stabilize our financial performance and improve our subscribers’ base”.

Thursday, November 27, 2014

MultiChoice grows DTT footprint

Naspers has reported an increase of 342,000 households across its African pay-TV business in the first half.

The company, which operates under the MultiChoice brand, now has services available in 873,000 households. Around 1.2 million subscribers have a PVR.

The segment reported a revenue increase of 18% year over year to reach R20.2 billion and delivering a profit of R5 billion.

MultiChoice now runs DTT services in 11 countries and Naspers in now looking towards further analogue switch offs to further grow the business.

Local content hubs are being developed in Nigeria and Kenya; and additional transponder capacity has recently been purchased from Eutelsat and Intelsat.

New DTH, mobile OTT platforms for Slovakia

Antik Telecom will launch a new DTH platform in Slovakia in the first quarter of 2015. It will offer more HD channels than any other service in the country.

Antik Telecom will also launch a mobile TV service over the internet, known as Antik TV Go, in the first week of December.

According to the company, the DTH service will be distributed by Eutelsat 16 at 16 degrees East, only a few degrees from the popular 19.2 degrees East slot.

This will allow viewers to watch hundreds of FTA channels from Astra and Eutelsat in addition to the new service.

The Basic package will cost €0.99 a month, while the family package, offering around 80 channels, eight on a TV archive basis, will cost €8.80 a month.

They will, in addition, be offered several other packages, including a Family Premium one for €7.80 a month.

All told, the hybrid DTH platform will offer viewers 100 satellite and 50 internet channels, with a third of the channels being in HD.

Viewers will be able to receive the service by buying a pre-paid card for €29 and AntikSAT satellite and IP HD box for €69. A CA module will cost €39 and complete reception equipment, including a dish, €119.

All packages will give access to a TV archive containing programmes broadcast in the previous 10 days.

Furthermore, they will be able to watch the service on mobile devices for no additional fee.

Those who register to receive the service before the end of this year will be able to view the Family package free of charge for three months.

Significantly, customers will not be required to sign a contract.

Antik says the service will also include dozens of internet channels and other features already familiar to subscribers who have the AntikSAT box.

Meanwhile, Antik TV Go will offer internet users with smartphones and tablets up to 47 channels, with viewers being given the option to pay for the OTT service with three (€7.50), six (€14.40) or 12 (€27.60) month subscriptions. Eight of the channels will be available as an archive.

Reception of the OTT service will be through a new proprietary box known as the SmartTVBox Nano. Including integrated Wi-Fi, it will cost users €89.

Prior to a press conference taking place today (November 26) in Bratislava, it was reported in the local media that Antik would not cooperate with any existing players in the Slovak DTH market, namely the M7 Group (Skylink), Slovak Telekom (New Digi TV and Newc Magio sat) and UPC DTH (freeSAT).

Russian DTH sale ruled out

Russia’s MTS has dismissed the possibility of buying Raduga TV, the DTH platform backed by Modern Times Group (MTG).

Speaking in a press conference discussing MTS’ latest set of results and quoted by AKTR and Comnews, Andrei Dubovskov, the company’s president, said that there was really nothing to buy, with any potential gain being marginal due to “other encumbrances”.

Analysts welcomed his comments, pointing to the legal risks that would be involved in acquiring Raduga TV, the owners of which have been embroiled in a dispute with Roskomnadzor over licences.

As previously reported in Broadband TV News, last month the Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) gave Digital Broadcasting, which is owned by Sistema Mass Media (SMM), permission to acquire 100% of DalGeoKom (Raduga TV). However, SMM has yet to decide whether to undertake the acquisition.

MTS meanwhile announced the launch of its own DTH platform, in partnership with SMM, on November 12.

In its latest set of results, MTS says that in terms of subscribers the DTH market in Russia is expected to grow by 42% from 13.1 million to 18.6 million between 2013-2018.

Its value is projected to grow by 40% to R31.3 billion (€552.2 million) over the same period.

Akado drops Russian station

The Russian cable operator Akado has ceased its cooperation with VKT (‘Your Commercial Television’), one of the country’s longest-established independent broadcasters.

According to Kommersant, VKT had total debts of over R27 billion (€476.3 million) as of last year and is facing claims from a number of its creditors.

However, it has so far avoided bankruptcy.

Interestingly, Akado and VKT have a common co-owner in the shape of Renova Media, backed by Yuri Pripachkin and Viktor Vekselberg.

VKT says that Akado is no longer carrying it due to the ban on advertising on cable and DTH channels that comes into effect at the beginning of 2015.

South Indian MSOs to form Federation

According to a report by Indian Television, MSOs in Southern India are planning to form a South Indian Federation. The federation will launch officially in December in Kerala.

The group is looking at developing common platforms using a single middleware in order to reduce the cost of providing value added services. “A technical team has already been formed for this and they are working on getting the service in place,” Sudhish Kumar, executive director of Sagar E Technologies, told Indian Television. The MSOs see offering broadband as the most promising way to generate additional revenue.

The MSOs together provide services in Bengaluru, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Kerala via 20 headends to around 3 million subscribers.

Tuesday, November 25, 2014

Telkom, MultiChoice strike DStv Explora and data deal

Wifi connector and Explora combo (Photo Supplied)