The curtain has come down on Dahlia TV after talks failed to prolong the life of the Italian DTT operation. In a statement posted on the website, the company said despite multiple attempts to ensure the continuity of programs, and maintain an active structure, the non-materialisation of agreements had forced the company to cease transmissions.
It has emerged that Telecom Italia Media had not accepted a proposal by administrator Filippo Chiusano to save the pay-TV platform. “TI Media is not in a position to make further sacrifices, [Dahlia] has serious problems, is still leaking significantly and we cannot afford to make more sacrifices,” said Telecom Italia CEO Franco Bernabé.
TI Media maintained a minority shareholding after it sold its former terrestrial business unit to the Swedish Airplus TV in 2008. It is thought that Airplus backers, the influential Wallenberg family, had refused to put further money into the venture.
Dahlia entered administration in January, though production company Filmmaster had warned a month earlier that it had a backlog of unpaid invoices. Filmmaster was responsible for the coverage of Dahlia’s Serie A football coverage.
The former La7 Cartapiù had around 800,000 registered users, of which it is thought around 250,000 cards remained active.