The leading Russian DTH platform Tricolor TV has published an open letter criticising Alexei Volin, the country’s deputy minister of communications and mass media.
In it, Tricolor TV takes exception to comments he made in an interview that appeared on the Forbes.ru website on July 17 concerning the 2006 federal law “On advertising” and how it distinguishes between paid (DTH/cable) and FTA channels.
The most contentious of these was that Tricolor TV’s business is not to serve customers but the sale of equipment, something that is strongly denied by the platform, which says that its main source of income is in fact subscription fees.
It adds that it is not engaged and has never worked in the sale of reception equipment, instead forming TV packages and distributing TV signals through leased transponder capacity on satellites.
Tricolor TV also says that at the same time it considers ARPU growth a priority and has always believed in providing subscribers with qualitatively new services, introducing new TV packages, improving content offers and new technology.
It concludes by inviting Volin to a discussion in its offices. It is “very important for us to know your opinion about the market and the possible prospects of its development”.
