New IPTV platform for Czech Republic

The Czech Republic is expected to see the launch of a new IPTV service on May 1. Speaking exclusively to Broadband TV News at the Czech Association of Competitive Communications (CACC) conference in Prague, Jiri Purs, the owner of Prozeta Broadcasters, said it will start to operate a platform known as Quickmedia with a number of strategic investors and business partners including Sloane Property Park (the operators of one of the biggest fibre optic networks in the country) and Net4Net (formerly known as Transgasnet). Its partners group together a large number of ISPs serving a total of around 700,000 clients. Of these, some 100,00-150,000 will have the potential to receive Quickmedia. Quickmedia will offer a basic package of 35 TV channels for a monthly fee of CZK260 (€9.28), along with an a la carte option that will include HD services. It will initially employ MPEG-2 set-top boxes before moving on to proprietary receivers produced jointly with a company named Coproses.