French media group Vivendi has announced it is to offer €495 million for a controlling stake in pay-TV operator Canal Plus (Société d’Edition de Canal Plus). Vivendi already owns around 48.5 per cent of the company, and its supervisory board has approved a public tender offer of €7.60 per share. It says it is making […]
Satellite TV [DTH or DBS] revenues will overtake total cable TV revenues in 2015, according to Digital TV Research. Covering 138 countries, the Digital TV World Revenue Forecasts report estimates that satellite TV accounted for 44 per cent of the total in 2014, rising to 46 per cent by 2020. However, cable TV revenues
UK PM David Cameron plans to decriminalise watching TV without paying the licence fee. In the UK, it is currently against the law to watch or record live TV programmes without a licence, and the offence can lead to prosecution and a fine of up to £1,000. The Conservatives have previously aborted attempts to make […]
The Blu-ray Disc Association (BDA) has completed its specification for its Ultra-HD devices. Consumers should be able to buy UHD discs and players during Q4 this year. “For years, Blu-ray Disc has set the standard for high definition picture and audio quality in the home. Ultra-HD Blu-ray will do the same for UHD home entertainment,” […]
The Internet Security Task Force – a newly formed group of small businesses banding together to protect content creators and consumers from the negative effects of piracy – has called for an end to the Copyright Alert System, based on new evidence that shows the anti-piracy initiative is not only ineffective but actually makes matters […]
Eutelsat ticked all of the right boxes in declaring its 3 months and 9 months revenue and profit numbers. But despite a slew of highly positive statements analysts remain concerned that Eutelsat is now introducing various caveats as to future performance. Total revenues at the Paris-based satellite operator for the 9 months to March 31st […]
Deutsche Telekom has reported a quarterly profit helped by its US operations and the weak euro. EBITDA excluding special items rose to €4.57 billion. Profit was helped by €175 million from an out-of-court settlement with Liberty Global’s German unit Unitymedia over the acquisition of KabelBW. Europe’s largest telco by revenue said it still expected 2015 […]
The BBC has confirmed the global version of its iPlayer streaming service will close on June 26th. The corporation had charged users subscription fees to watch programmes via the app in Western Europe, Australia and Canada. However, it never launched in the US. Reports suggest US pay-TV operators had threatened to drop the BBC America […]
People are spending twice as much time online compared to 10 years ago, fuelled by increasing use of tablets and smartphones, according to Ofcom research. Ofcom’s Media Use and Attitudes 2015 report shows
An analysis of the Latin American market by Dataxis says that at the end of 2014 some 29 per cent of DTH subscribers were viewing on some sort of pre-paid scheme, and this is up from 25 per cent in 2013. The numbers show that pre-pay isn’t simply