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Scroll down page or click below for news - latest first
Tuesday Ofcom warns on EU media rules
TP set for triple play
Judge queries Seven’s pay-TV ambition
BT’s Future Vision
Cabsat industry urges India regulation rethink
Operax set for expansion with $15m boost
Gore’s Current TV teams with Yahoo
Bravo marks coming of age with revamp
Ofcom warns on EU media rulesUK comms regulator Ofcom has warned that proposals to extend EU rules on the content of audiovisual services to new media platforms could stifle innovation. The plans, unveiled by media commissioner Viviane Reding in December 2005, would mean that the current Television without Frontiers Directive would be extended to cover new media formats, including online IPTV and mobile phones. Ofcom has expressed concern that Reding’s proposals do not differentiate between platforms.
Tim Suter, Ofcom’s partner responsible for contents and standards believes that the ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach taken by the commission could have adverse effects. "The commission’s ‘platform neutral’ approach is very seductive, but it is also deeply wrong," he told theparliament.com.
He suggests that Reading’s argument, that the best way is to keep the regulations future proof and ensure that they do not become obsolete as technology progresses could have the opposite effect. "By forcing every new technology to comply with such rigid rules, the commission could seriously hamstring innovation in the EU."
An Ofcom-commissioned impact assessment focuses on three key areas – IPTV, mobile multimedia and online games. "Its findings are worrying," Suter said.
Parliament will vote on the proposals in early December, but Ofcom is hopeful of progress before then, at November’s meeting of EU culture ministers.
Ofcom even said that the Commission should question whether regulation was needed at all. "The Commission should examine whether or not there is a continued need for regulatory measures," it said. "Over-regulation risks otherwise driving key strategic activities outside of the EU."
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Customers of Telekomunikacja Polska, Poland’s leading telecoms provider, will soon be able to take a triple play service - multipack tp, combining television, the Internet and telephone. Multipack tp will also include a Video on Request service. Multipack tp will be offered to customers from Warsaw, Poznan, Krakow, Gdansk, Wroclaw and Katowice from 16 October 2006.
On 23 September Telekomunikacja Polska is going to introduce its video on request service. The service will constitute an integral part of videostrada tp and multipack tp.
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Judge queries Seven’s pay-TV ambition
From Rose Major in MelbourneThe judge presiding over the C7 court case in Australia has said he is "trying to come to terms" with why the Seven Network did not just bid more for Australian Rules football (AFL) rights in 2000 to try to keep its pay-TV sports channel in business.
Seven is suing a number of parties, including Foxtel’s shareholders News Corp, Telstra and PBL, over alleged anti-competitive practices which Seven says forced the company to close C7 in 2002.
But Seven’s lawyer told Justice Ronald Sackville that the AFL said it was not interested in a C7 bid which matched Foxtel’s A$30-million-a-year (E17.8 milion). Seven alleges this was because Foxtel had told the AFL it would not carry C7 if the channel won the rights. C7 had bid A$24 million a year.
The judge has already questioned whether C7 might just have been an "inferior" product. "What if the transaction or agreement involves the acquisition of a better mouse trap, and your competitor produces a mouse trap which is inferior (and) goes out of business because it can't compete with the better mouse trap?" he asked Seven’s lawyers.
But not everything has been going swimmingly for the respondents. Justice Sackville said that comments by Seven’s lawyers that News Corp had "deliberately done away...with much of the documentation that would have enabled the court to control their evidence," would be regarded "as having some force". Many relevant emails had been deleted, the court heard.
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BT’s Future VisionFuture Plus, the customer-publishing agency of Future Publishing, is to supply editorial content for BT Vision, the telco’s IPTV service, which is scheduled for launch in autumn 2006. Future will supply BT Vision’s editorial requirements for the as well as the BT Vision online store. Future will provide news, independent reviews of entertainment and programme listings for the film, TV and music services.
Future will also support the editorial requirements of BT Vision’s interactive services as they develop, including community forums, special-interest areas and reader-generated content along with user ratings and popularity charts.
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Cabsat industry urges India regulation rethink
The Cable and Satellite Broadcasting Association of Asia (CASBAA) has called on the Government of India to make a dramatic shift in its regulatory approach to the pay-TV industry. "The Indian authorities’ current positioning is holding back the industry and introducing significant new constraints of the kind that slowed India’s economic development for decades," said Simon Twiston Davies, the CASBAA CEO.According to CASBAA, recent initiatives by the Ministry of Information & Broadcasting (MIB) and the Telecoms Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) will severely limit development, not just of pay-TV, but of the entire Indian communications industry.
CASBAA said it would like to see more emphasis on promoting growth, rather than on restricting market flexibility, adding that international and domestic examples of thriving, lightly regulated markets are plentiful.
CASBAA also believes that the proposed Broadcast Services Bill would create a new pay-TV industry regulator potentially subject to political interference. "India needs to install a truly independent communications industry regulator," said Twiston Davies. "Regulatory decisions should be technical and quasi-judicial, responding to the demands of the fast-changing media environment, and not subject to transient political pressures," he concluded.
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Operax set for expansion with $15m boostQoS control and bandwidth management specialist Operax announces has raised US $15 million in Series C funding for its further global expansion supporting convergent all-IP broadband networks. Existing investors Nordic Venture Partners, Innovacom and Emano also participated in this round.
Anders Lindén, CEO Operax., said the company could strengthen its focus on existing projects, as well as being able to address new business opportunities.
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Gore’s Current TV teams with Yahoo
Yahoo is creating an online video programming venture with Current TV, the media company founded by former Vice President Al Gore. The service will combine professional and user-generated video clips.Current’s editors aim to make viral videos "one of the hottest trends on the Internet" attractive to advertisers. Most clips will be preceded by a 15- or 30-second commercial ¹ the first time Yahoo has included commercials with user-generated content.
The service begins with four channels. One section, called Current Buzz, will feature segments related to the news. Three other channels will relate to specialised topics: travel, action sports, and cars. The companies hope to add more channels.
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Bravo marks coming of age with revampOnce one of a handful of channels in the early days of multi-channel TV on the UK, entertainment channel Bravo is marking its 21st year with a revamp. September 2006 will see the launch of a brand-new on and off-air identity, the introduction of exclusive US and British drama, new comedy and animation genres to the programming schedule, the first major marketing campaign for the channel in five years, and the launch of a new channel, Bravo 2.
To complement Bravo’s progression into a classic and confident channel, Flextech Television is relaunching Player as Bravo 2, aimed at the younger end of the male audience.
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Thursday 21st September
Murdoch ambitious for MySpace
Disney sells 125,000 videos on iTunes in week
Imagenio postpones HD launch
Yahoo falls on ad fear
EchoStar Anti-Piracy Raids
IPTV "ready for Prime Time"
WB expands VOD
Murdoch ambitious for MySpaceNews Corp. Chairman and CEO Rupert Murdoch says he has big plans for social networking site MySpace. Murdoch said that he hopes to eventually launch a version of MySpace in several more countries, including China within the next year or so. He also said MySpace hopes to take the market lead in online video from privately held YouTube in the next 60 to 70 days.
Despite the success of MySpace, Murdoch ruled out the possibility of a public spinoff of its Fox Interactive Media unit or other divisions. "We tried that with Fox and it didn't work," he said, referring to News Corp.'s spin-off of a minority stake in its movie and TV business a few years ago. News Corp. eventually bought back the stake in Fox that it sold to the public.
Murdoch also confirmed News Corp. was in "more active discussions" with Liberty Media regarding a possible swap of assets.
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Disney sells 125,000 videos on iTunes in weekDisney has sold 125,000 online film downloads a week after agreeing to make its titles available on Apple’s iTunes store. The sales have added about $1m in incremental revenue to the media company, according to chief executive Bob Iger, who expressed confidence that revenues from the new film venture could reach $50m in its first year.
Disney broke with other Hollywood studios when it agreed to make 75 titles available on iTunes at prices ranging from $9.99 to $14.99. Other Hollywood studios have also talked about ramping up digital distribution but have taken a slower approach so far - partly out of fear of antagonising Wal-Mart, who they rely on as the largest seller of DVDs.
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Imagenio postpones HD launch
From David Del Valle in Madrid
Telefonica's IPTV service, Imagenio, has decided to postpone the launch of its High Definition services until at least Summer next year "for lack of demand".
The company had planned to introduce its first HD services by the end of this year, creating a specific HD package dedicated to sports and cinema. But, "the lack of demand", according to Imagenio, has obliged it to hold it off. In other pay-TV operators' plans, such as Digital Plus and cable companies, HD is also not a priority, despite the fact that the sale of HD-ready sets is growing with more than 1 million HD sets already in the market.
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Yahoo shares have fallen nearly 11 per cent after it said weakness in financial and car advertising could hit its third quarter sales. Carmakers Ford and GM have been cutting their advertising budgets as they try to slash overall costs. Shares in Google fell 4 per cent as investors worried that other online media firms dependent on advertising could be hit. In July, Yahoo forecast third quarter sales in the range of $1.12bn to $1.23bn.
Meanwhile, Yahoo is to launch a new online-video network with Al Gore's Current TV that will add four channels of ad-supported video programming to the Internet company's Web video service. Yahoo said its Current Network will combine technology for finding, watching and uploading videos online with Current TV's blend of professional content and user-submitted video to create programming designed to appeal to younger audiences.
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EchoStar Communications and its security partner NagraStar, along with Canada’s Bell ExpressVu, conducted a massive civil raid on several locations throughout Ontario, Canada, suspected of participating in illegal satellite-signal intercepting and descrambling. The companies said the operation was in cooperation with law enforcement to combat pirates.
According to EchoStar the raids were simultaneously conducted at stores and residences in Canadian cities. The company publicly named seven individuals who were subject to the raid saying several members of the suspect's families were also involved in the investigation. EchoStar said thousands of satellite piracy devices were confiscated along with customer records.As a result, 17 web addresses have been disabled including spacetwister.com, angelpride.com, devilscrypt.com, dssword.com, ftafix.com, dsstoybox.com, extremen2.com, globalpayment.com, disharm.com, internationalhosting.info, outerlimitsatellitesupplies.com, satgroup.ca, overseashostingonline.com, dishtoybox.com, nagra2hack.com, dsswholesale.com and www.armsecuritysolutions.com.
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Detecon, the US telecommunications technology consulting firm that is part of Deutsche Telekom, believes "IPTV is poised to become the framework for incremental revenue growth as telcos and cable MSOs go head to head."
According to Eckart Pech, CEO of Detecon, "IPTV will play a key role in competition around the world as the telecom and entertainment industries converge, and IPTV is ready for prime time." Detecon believes that with continued focus and much-needed additional CAPEX, telcos will be successful at deploying IPTV, transforming themselves into full service providers.
They also point out that success in IPTV is really a necessity for telcos:
"If the telcos fail at IPTV, they will suffer greatly," explains Dr. Patrick
Pfeffer, Chief Network Architect at Detecon. "Other facility-based
operators such as MSOs, or new entrants like Google or Yahoo, will quickly
erode telco revenues."Detecon's report is part of the IEC's Analyst Corner includes a discussion on IPTV architecture, middleware issues, video on demand and other key aspects to IPTV. Detecon also includes an update on the progress made by several players who have successfully deployed the service.
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WB expands VOD
Warner Bros. is expanding its video on demand deal with TVN Entertainment. Distribution of the programming via TVN will now extend beyond MSOs to include IPTV outlets and telcos."Content security is a critical element in our evaluation of new partners," said Deanne Lewis, director of VOD and pay per view sales for Warner Bros. Digital Distribution, saying the company was "pleased with TVN’s strong commitment to content protection, encryption and watermarking."
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Wednesday 20th September
Microsoft’s YouTube?
FCC gains $13.9bn in wireless auction
Orion Cable takes over Telecolumbus
Disney kids player
TI crisis continues
BT Vision partners with Emap mags
ITV defends Play
blinkx extreme sports
New prez for EchoStar
Microsoft’s YouTube?Microsoft has begun testing an Internet video-sharing service called Soapbox, its answer to YouTube. Soapbox will be offered to a limited number of users during an invitation-only test phase, but Microsoft said it will go fully live as a part of MSN Video within six months.
"We're definitely not blind to the fact that YouTube has a big lead right now," said Rob Bennett, general manager of MSN's entertainment and video services. Microsoft is a late arrival into the crowded video-sharing market, following offerings from Google, Yahoo, AOL unit and MySpace. Last month, Sony Corp. agreed to pay $65 million to buy video-sharing site Grouper.com. Focused on original programming and clips from broadcast partners, MSN Video was once the most popular Internet video site.
Microsoft aims to win over users with a Soapbox player that allows people to categorize, share and comment on videos, all while the video continues to play uninterrupted. In a departure from its past strategy of restricting MSN Video to its Internet Explorer browser and Windows Media Player, Microsoft will make Soapbox available for various browsers including Mozilla, Firefox and Apple 's Safari. Soapbox will also support a number of video file formats and delivery methods.
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FCC gains $13.9bn in wireless auctionUS government sale of airwaves for advanced wireless services grossed $13.9 billion with T-Mobile topping the bidding by offering $4.2 billion for 120 licenses. The Federal Communications Commission auction ended after no new bids or withdrawals occurred in the 161st round of the sale of 1,122 licenses.
The winning companies are expected to use the airwaves to expand and improve existing voice services as well as expand their high-speed Internet and video services. There are about 219 million wireless subscribers in the United States. Winning more airwaves was crucial for T-Mobile, the No. 4 U.S. provider because it has less airwaves in the top markets than its larger rivals. It won regional licenses that cover large portions of the United States as well as individual licenses for key markets like New York, Chicago and San Francisco.
Another top bidder was the consortium of major U.S. cable providers Comcast, Time Warner and Cox Communications which teamed up with No. 3 wireless carrier Sprint Nextel.The group won 137 licenses with bids of $2.4 billion, including Washington D.C., Detroit and Atlanta, among other cities.
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Orion Cable takes over Telecolumbus
From Dieter Brockmeyer in FrankfurtOrion Cable GmbH has acquired Telecolumbus with its remaining 1.5 million Level 4 cable homes from Unity Media. The purchase price was not revealed. Unity had already sold the homes in its own regions in of NRW, Hesse and Baden Wurttemberg to the regional operator KabelBW.
Orion, the holding of a group of investment companies (Aletheia Partners, HARDT Group, ABN Amro Capital und Quilvest) at the end of last year acquired the majority stake in the independent cabler ewt/tss reaching about two million homes and earlier this year became with 27 per cent the largest shareholder in Primacom reaching about one million direct homes. Orion, judged by the number of cable homes reached directly, is the largest cabler in Germany. The larger companies KDG, KableBW or Unity, supply more homes but most of them they still do not own directly.
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Disney plans to introduce its own portable video and audio player aimed at kids between the ages of 9 and 13 with a device that plays music and movies stored on either its hard drive or a memory card. The "Mix Max", while not a direct competitor to the video iPod, is entering similar space by targeting younger consumers. Priced at $99, the Mix Max is set for retail in late October. The device has a 2.5-inch colour screen and comes with enough memory to hold six hours of video or about 240 songs.
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Telecom Italia’s troubles took on a new dimension as prosecutors in Rome announced that they would be looking into evidence of criminal wrongdoing. Evidence the government had an influential role in the affairs of a quoted company has put Romano Prodi's government into a major political row.
In the latest development, Angelo Rovati, an adviser to Prodi, resigned. Rovati was the author of a report sent to the management of Telecom Italia, whose existence was revealed in the press last week, recommending the group sell its fixed-line operations to a state holding company. Telecom Italia announced a major change in strategy that would allow it to concentrate on broadband and media. The company said it intended creating two new firms, one each for its fixed-line and mobile operations.
Prodi explained his astonishment, saying that Telecom Italia's chairman, Marco Tronchetti Provera, had not told him about the restructuring at a meeting this month. To back his assertion, the government then took the unusual step of releasing a statement with details of their discussion, including market-sensitive information on possible link-ups with News Corp, Time Warner and General Electric. Thus lead to Tronchetti Provera’s resignation.
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BT Vision partners with Emap magsBT has struck an exclusive deal with Emap to provide branded music videos and programming for its forthcoming TV-via-broadband service, BT Vision. The deal involves leading Emap brands such as Q, Kerrang!, Mojo, FHM, Smash Hits, Kiss, The Box and Magic.
"We are delighted to be BT Vision's exclusive partner for music video video-on-demand," said Dharmash Mistry, the managing director of Emap Consumer Media and Emap Performance.
BT has already struck a string of content deals with BBC Worldwide, Paramount, Endemol, DreamWorks and the National Geographic Channel.
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ITV has defended its quiz-based channel ITV Play, after Ofcom raised concerns about compaints. Early results show ITV Play could hit its first year profit target of £20m (E29m), on revenues of about £60m.
Matt Peacock from Ofcom said: "We have altered our guidelines for these channels recently but the complaints have continued to rise. We are monitoring the situation closely."
A spokesperson for ITV Play said: "ITV is a responsible broadcaster and we take that role very seriously. We have measures in place that tell viewers what the costs are and how much they are spending. Ultimately whether someone rings in is up to them, but it is an informed choice."
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blinkx extreme sports
blinkx announced a partnership with Freecaster, the world's largest library of extreme sports clips. blinkx will index hours of Freecaster's premiere sports and music clips. Users can find highlights from events like the Red Bull Air Race World Series, the Red Bull X Fighters and the Braun cruZer Tour. blinkx.tv will also feature Freecaster's major athlete and rock.
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Seven months after the exit of Michael Neuman, EchoStar Communications has named Carl Vogel as president. Vogel will continue to serve as vice chairman of EchoStar's board. Vogel has most recently focused on EchoStar’s financial and strategic initiatives, and he will retain responsibility for them. He returned to EchoStar in May 2005 after serving as president and CEO of Charter Communications.
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Tuesday 19th September
Investors cool on NTL deal
Warner license YouTube
Freescale to investors for $17bn
TI buys AOL Germany
Competition hots up in Spanish IPTV
Arqiva and BBC DTT contract
Emuse and Teletext partnership
Investors cool on NTL dealA private equity consortium which has been working on a $20bn bid for NTL is reconsidering it position says the FT. Members of the consortium, which is led by Providence Equity and includes Blackstone, Cinven and Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, had held talks with NTL but are understood to have failed to agree terms with the owners including Sir Richard Branson, and Bill Huff, the distressed debt investor.
Branson who sold Virgin Mobile to NTL controls a 10.5 per cent stake, Huff, who pushed NTL’s merger with Telewest, has 7 per cent. Some owners had indicated they would hold out for at least $34 a share, which would value NTL’s equity at $11bn – about the same level as its debt. But one adviser to the consortium said even weeks agao it wasn’t going to offer near $34, and the business has got worse since then. In its results, NTL cited intense competition and merger integration issues for a dip in broadband customers. Its shares were at $25.44 New York at the end of last week.
Meanwhile, Simon Duffy, the former head of NTL who was moved aside when Steve Burch became chief executive, is understood to be planning to step down from the board.
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Warner license YouTubeWarner Bros has agreed to make its library of music videos available to YouTube, marking the first time that an established record company has agreed to make its content library available to the user-generated media company. Users will be permitted incorporate material from WB videos into their own clips, which are then uploaded to YouTube. Warner and YouTube will share advertising revenue sold in connection with the video content.
Universal Music, the largest record company, last week threatened to sue YouTube for compensation. "Consumer-empowering destinations like YouTube have created a two-way dialogue that will transform entertainment and media forever," said Edgar Bronfman, Jr., Warner’s chief executive.
For YouTube, the agreement represents a way to generate revenues from a new internet medium that has been wildly popular among users but has yet to deliver much commercial benefit. "Partnering with Warner Music Group is one of the most significant milestones for our company and our community, and shifts the paradigm in this new media movement," said Chad Hurley, YouTube’s chief executive.
Warner Music last month became the first music label to partner with YouTube by launching a "brand channel" where users can view branded content on a specially designed YouTube page. The channel, which was set up to promote sales of "Paris", the debut album by Paris Hilton, the celebrity hotel heiress, was funded in part by advertisements for a television series by Fox Broadcasting.
Sunday’s deal will coincide with the rollout by YouTube of a new filtering technology designed to monitor content from partners like Warner across its site. That technology will help determine royalties for artists and other rights holders. It will also allow YouTube to remove user-generated clips based on Warner material that the company deems offensive.
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Freescale to investors for $17bn
Chip maker Freescale Semiconductor has agreed to be bought for $17.6 billion by a consortium of private equity firms led by Blackstone Group. But the company has a provision that lets it solicit alternative proposals from third parties during the next 50 days.
Another investor group including Apax Partners, Bain Capital, Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. and Silver Lake Partners also bid for the company, according to sources. If it accepts a superior proposal, Freescale would have to pay a break-up fee, the company said, but it said there was no "assurance of any alternative proposal."
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Telecom Italia has agreed to buy Time Warner's AOL Internet access business in Germany for E675 million in cash. The move will make TI Germany's second-largest broadband provider, with more than 3.2 million total subscribers including nearly 2 million broadband customers.
AOL has aimed to sell off its access business but retain agreements to make the AOL.com free Web site and services as the default setting for those subscribers. In France, it has entered into exclusive negotiations to sell its access business to Neuf Cegetel.
Meanwhile, Telecom Italia is in the midst of a political struggle over its strategic future which has led to the resignation of chairman Marco Tronchetti Provera. TI wants to sell mobile business TIM but the government objects to this U turn on its previous ‘converged’ model.
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Competition hots up in Spanish IPTV
From David Del Valle in MadridSoon after Telefonica’s revamp of its Imagenio service, the IPTV service operated by the telco Jazztel, Jazztelia TV, is making a full-frontal assault on the Spanish IPTV market. To boost subscriptions and speed up its growth, Jazztel is giving away its pay-TV service until the end of the year to those new clients with ADSL connections from 6 to 20 megabytes.
Jazztelia TV currently has 32 TV channels, with the 22 DTT channels to be added in the near future, as well as video on demand. Among its channels are Real Madrid TV, Fox, AXN, TCM, Canal Historia, Hollywood, Discovery Channel, Nacional Geographic or Bloomberg.
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Arqiva and BBC DTT contractThe BBC and Arqiva have concluded contracts for the design, deployment, and operation of its new high-power digital terrestrial television (DTT) network. Arqiva will also build and operate additional transmitters to expand the coverage of the BBC's DAB digital radio network, with the possibility of up to a further 160 new DAB transmitters being ordered in the coming years.
The deal is expected to be worth, taking into account inflation, in excess of £1.8bn (E2.6bn) over the contract period. Under the terms of the contract, the new DTT services will be introduced on a region-by-region basis between 2008 and 2012.
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Emuse and Teletext partnership
Emuse absolutely and Teletext announce a deal that will offer interactive advertising to Teletext viewers across both digital satellite and digital terrestrial television platforms. Teletext viewers will now be able to access any emuse absolutely i-ad running for other broadcasters, enabling Teletext to offer rich functionality i-ads to new and existing clients. Both companies will promote this service to broadcasters in the UK.
Teletext will provide emuse absolutely with the capability to run additional i-ads on the DTT platform for other UK broadcasters such as ITV, Channel 4 and five.
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Monday 18th September
Murdoch: BT mustn’t give it away
News Corp to switch DirecTV for Liberty holding?
FCC: US DBS ops can’t merge
Telefonica multi-platform TV series
Fastweb, Vodafone quad play
TV Cabo loses 28,000 clients in second quarter
FX ads for FF
Zune for Xmas
Verizon, DirecTV Partner on MDUs
Jupiter 2006 Subscriber figures
Murdoch: BT mustn’t give it away
BSkyB chief executive, James Murdoch, has warned BT Vision: "If they want to just give away all of the expensive programming out there, that ends in a very scary place for them." Speaking at the Royal Television Society, he also turned his attention to the BBC and its iPlayer: "I think that whenever we see new services coming out of the state ... it's something that needs to be considered very, very carefully. It's important for the competitiveness of the industry and the future of innovation of this industry."
Murdoch said sky customers would be able to get all their on demand needs over one broadband connection by 2007-8. He also said the security flaw which led BSkyB to suspend its broadband download service, which allowed users to watch films and sports clips, would soon be sorted and would not stop Sky.
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News Corp to switch DirecTV for Liberty holding?
US press says News Corp is considering exchanging its controlling stake in DirecTV for the 19 per cent voting stake in News Corp owned by John Malone’s Liberty Media. Rupert Murdoch’s enthusiasm for DirecTV is said to have waned because of the difficulty and expense of adding broadband capability to its product, a bundle of services that he has said is increasingly important to customers and which cable rivals are already offering. BSkyB, where News has a large stake, is currently adding broadband capability but regulatory differences in the US which restrict access to telephone connections mean a similar strategy there is not possible.The talks between the two media veterans, first reported on the CNBC business news channel in the US on Thursday, is the latest stage of discussions which have been going on for months.
Murdoch has been keen to secure Liberty’s stake in order to ensure family control of the media empire that he has built up. He introduced a poison pill measure to prevent Mr Malone from increasing his stake, and shareholders will vote on its renewal at News Corp’s annual meeting on October 20.
A number of asset swaps have been discussed. A deal has to include an asset swap in order to minimise the tax that has to be paid on the stake. News Corp’s 38 per cent stake in DirecTV is currently worth around $9bn and Liberty’s News Corp stake is worth around $11bn.
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DirecTV and its main satellite rival, EchoStar, have talked about possibly merging to cut billions of dollars of costs from their operations, but regulators are still set against it. The television services being launched by telephone companies has not yet offered sufficient competition to allow consolidation in the satellite television industry, U.S. Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin has said. "At this point there's been a lot of talk of additional video entrants, in terms of the telco companies coming in and providing competition on the video side… but I don't think it's been widespread enough to talk about changing our analysis of the nationwide video market, which is what we did in the DBS (direct broadcast satellite) context," he told analysts.
Telefonica multi-platform TV series
From David Del Valle in Madrid
Telefonica has become the first European operator to offer a TV series through the Internet, IPTV and mobile phones. The fiction TV series "En buena compañía" will be available to Telefonica’s clients to its IPTV service Imagenio, its mobile phone company Movistar and its Terra-operated Internet service pixbox.com
The TV series, produced by Co.eficiente will be broadcast weekly by FORTA’s Regional channels and is composed of 12 episodes about new technologies. Imagenio and Movistar’s clients will be able to get additional content from the TV series as well as to watch the weekly episode before being broadcast by the TV channels.On Imagenio, once the TV series has been broadcast it will form part of Imagenio’s video on demand catalogue. On Movistar clients equipped with 3G terminals will have access to a channel dedicated to the TV series where they will watch each weekly episode before its TV transmission. In addition, clients will be able to download text, audio and video contents: summaries of episodes, description of all characters, interviews with actors, among others. Movistar will also develop a TV series of 15 mobisodes with a duration of 2 minutes each.
Internet users will be able to download each episode free of charge to their PC though pixbox one month after its TV broadcast. After that free of charge period each episode will cost E1.99.
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Fastweb, Vodafone quad play
Italian broadband operator Fastweb and the Italian unit of Vodafone are set to announce that Vodafone's clients will be able to use some broadband services supplied by Fastweb, the sources said. The deal will not involve Vodafone buying broadband capacity wholesale, but it is a step for both companies towards offering both mobile and fixed line services, sources said.
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TV Cabo loses 28,000 clients in second quarter
From Branislav Pekic in RomePortuguese pay-TV operator TV Cabo had a total of 1.444 million subscribers at the end of June 2006 (1.072 million clients for its cable TV service and 371,000 for its satellite service). An estimated 28,000 clients cancelled their subscription during the second quarter of 2006. The main reason for this high level of churn "is the current economic situation and the less favourable outlook for the future that translated into a reduction of pay-TV services", explained a company spokesperson. He added that the company will continue to invest in expanding and upgrading its cable network, underlining that 96.3 per cent of homes passed has a bi-directional connection, capable of supporting interactive services and broadband internet.
Broadband internet penetration in the cable TV subscriber base was 32.1 per cent, up 1.2 percentage points on the 2Q 2005. ARPU for pay-TV and broadband internet in Q2 was E29.20, a 4 per cent percent increase year-on-year, mainly due to the good performance of the digital package "Funtastic Life" and the increase of subscribers for the Sport TV channel. Revenues from pay-TV and broadband internet activities increased by 5.8 per cent to E292 million in the first half of 2006.
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FX ads for FFDigital channel FX has developed what it claims is the first television advert aimed at combating the growing number of viewers who fastforward through its commercial breaks. The channel will air the advert for upcoming series Brotherhood later this month.
The 30-second promo has been designed to retain its message when viewed at up to 12 times its normal speed. The trail recalls the earliest days in television advertising when a static image was common. Featuring a single image on the screen for the duration of the ad, the creative team behind it claim it will also remain entertaining at normal speed. FX, a division of News Corp's Fox International, said it hoped it would be a step towards providing "PVR resistant" solutions for all advertisers.
Microsoft has announced that its Zune digital music player will be released in the US in time for Christmas.
Unveiling more details of the player, which it hopes will rival Apple's iPod, Microsoft said it will be manufactured Toshiba and will come with a three-inch (7.6cm) colour screen. The Zune will also have wireless connectivity, allowing nearby users to exchange songs and photos. Microsoft hopes the Zune, which will also be able to play videos and includes a radio, will eat into the iPod's more than 75 per cent share of the digital music player market in the US.
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Verizon, DirecTV Partner on MDUs
Verizon and DirecTV have entered into an agreement to collectively serve the multiple dwelling unit (MDU) market with a bundle of services, an effort the companies said takes aim at cable and its triple-play offerings.Verizon said the multi-year agreement will enable it to serve as the single point of contact for a bundle of offerings that includes the telco's broadband and phone services in addition to DirecTV's offerings. Verizon said it will offer the DirecTV bundle in locations where it does not offer its own entertainment services, such as the fiber-supported FiOS TV.
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Jupiter 2006 Subscriber figures
Jupiter Telecommunications the largest multiple system operator in Japan announced that the total subscribing households as of August 31, 2006 served by J:COM's 19 managed franchises reached over 2.2 million, up 13.0 per cent since August 31, 2005. The increase is attributed to growth of subscribing households in existing service areas and the addition of newly consolidated franchises. Combined revenue generating units for J:COM TV, J:COM NET and J:COM PHONE reached 3.9 million overall, up 537,100 units or 15.8 per cent from the year earlier. The bundle ratio (the average number of services received per subscribing household) rose to 1.76 from 1.71 the year earlier.
Meantime J:COM will begin a trial in October for Fixed Mobile Convergence (FMC), a new telephone service which allows customers to have a single phone number which can be both fixed at home and mobile wherever they go.
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