ANGA CABLE – Cologne. The traditional opening session of Anga Cable is called the “elephants’ round” as it brings together some of the most important players in the German market. This year attention centered on the analogue switch-off and the introduction of the entavio encryption platform in particular. The positions are well defined and everyone knows the arguments.
What does the viewer think? Suddenly he has to pay for something that has been free for many years. On the other hand SES Astrra CEO Ferdinand Kayser insists entavio is the only way to covert analogue homes to digital “There are now 12.5 million digital homes in Germany, digital terrestrial, cable and satellite. Still, 25 million homes have to be converted and this will only succeed with an open, discrimination free platform. Look at Arena, even with an attractive offer such as football they find it very difficult to make business with a proprietary platform.”
Forced by the Bundeskartelamt (German monopoly authority) they company had to rethink the entavio project. “We had to turn it upside down, starting with the pay TV channels,” said Kayser, “later on the free TV programmes will come. At the moment Premiere is biggest offer, so we work with them.”
