Ofcom has said that Sky did not discriminate against Rapture in a dispute over EPG charges. Rapture said that it failed to have any meaningful negotiation with the satellite platform and when in November 2005 Sky began providing Rapture with EPG services it was at a price that Rapture believed to be unfair. In its […]
SES buys back GE shareholding
SES is establishing a new company as part of a €1.2 billion buyback of shares from GE. SES International Holdings will comprise The AMC-23 satellite and its related business; 100% of Satlynx; 49.5% of Bowenvale (representing a 34.1% interest in AsiaSat); 19.99% of Star One and 5.5% of Orbcomm. GE will swap its 103,149,900 shares […]
Croatian telco sale approaches
According to local reports, JP Morgan has selected the Croatian Postal Bank (HPB) and Erste Bank as the local brokers for the third phase of the privatisation of the Croatian incumbent telco T-HT. The two beat off competition from several other bidders including Raiffeisen and Zagrebacka Banka. An IPO for the sale of 20% of […]
100+ complaints over Sky cable promos
Customers protesting at BSkyB’s call to action on the possible withdrawal of its channels from the Virgin Media platform have sent more than 100 complaints to the Advertising Standards Authority. The promotions have been carried on the dedicated cable feeds of BSkyB’s channels, including Sky One, Sky News and Sky Travel, amid heated negotiations over […]
Mixed results for Magyar Telekom
The incumbent Hungarian telco Magyar Telekom saw its revenues grow by 9.1% to HUF671.2 billion (€2.54 billion) in 2006, while its net income fell by 2.2% to HUF76.7 billion due to higher depreciation and amortization. Its Internet revenues rose by 27.1% thanks largely to significant growth in the number of broadband connections. Mainly ADSL and […]
ATM Grupa surges ahead
Poland’s leading independent production company ATM Grupa has posted revenues of PLN86.5 million (€22.1 million) for 2006, or 19% more than the previous year. At the same time, its net profit rose by 72% to PLN20.3 million. ATM Grupa specialises in light entertainment formats and has a feature film co-production agreement with MTL Maxfilm. It […]
Digital+ continues Spanish growth
Spanish pay-TV platform Digital+ closed the year on 2,044,000 subscribers, adding 38,000 net subs on the quarter, and 84,000 on the year. The DTH platform continues to be available from both the Astra and Hispasat satellites. The climb in subscriber numbers is due to both an increase in gross additions and a fall in churn, […]
First live demo of Alcatel’s Unlimited Mobile TV
3GSM CONGRESS – BARCELONA – Alcatel-Lucent shows the first demo of the proposed Unlimited Mobile TV service using the new DVB-SH standard, which combines satellite broadcasts in the S-band with terrestrial gap fillers. The prototype was made by Sagem, but Samsung will also produce a working model in the near future. With the system, which […]
JumpTV announces 11 new channels
JumpTV Inc, a broadcaster of ethnic television over the Internet, announced today that it has signed 11 new exclusive internet broadcast agreements with channels from Pakistan, Thailand, Lebanon, Nigeria and Benin, expanding its network to 270 channels from 70 countriues under license. Channels signed include: ORTB (Benin), Channels TV, Lagos TV and MiTV (Nigeria), Zam […]
TV4 adds HD channel
TV4 Sweden is adding a high definition service to its stable of digital TV channels. The new station will be distributed via Canal Digital and launches later this first quarter. Next year the channel will screen HD coverage of the European football championships. Earlier this month Canal+ added Canal+ Sport HD to its existing Canal+ […]