Russia will shortly see the launch of yet another DTH platform, bringing the total number operating in the country to at least six.
Satkurier reports that the new service will be known as Telekarta and employ Intelsat 15 at 85.2 degrees East to distribute a package of 18 channels.
Telekarta will use Conax conditional access and MPEG-2 compression. Its offer, though mostly Russian services, will include the international channels Discovery and Universal.
Telekarta will be a pre-pay service and available to viewers for R600 (€15.3) a year or R2 daily. It is also likely to share capacity with Continent TV, the DTH service launched by Orion Express, yet another platform, earlier this year.
Russia’s DTH market is also served by NTV-Plus and Tricolor, both of which are backed by Gazprom-Media; Platforma HD; and Raduga TV, which is backed by Modern Times Group (MTG).
