Commercial digital terrestrial television broadcasting (DVB-T) in Slovakia will begin at the end of this year, according to Radio Nederland’s Medianetwork.
A spokesman for the Slovak Telecommunications Office, Roman Vavro, told the SITA newswire that “according to valid and effective licences for transmission of television programme service in the DVB-T standard, which the Telecommunications Office issued to the company Towercom, the holder of the licences is obliged to launch commercial services of the first multiplex network on December 31, 2009 and at that time signal must cover 79.7% of the population.”
Subsequently, by the end of March 2010 the DVB-T signal will cover 89.4%. The second multiplex and the public-service multiplex will be in commercial operation as of June 30, 2010. Vavro further stated in an official press release that the licence holder will support the state information campaign before the DVB-T service is launched into commercial operation.
The licences came into force on September 23, 2009. On September 9, the Telecommunications Office issued 35 licences to Towercom, which had won a tender to operate DVB-T in Slovakia. (See Broadband TV News passim)
