Advanced Television

Amdocs acquires Vubiquity for $224m

In a move that sees it further expand into the media and entertainment business, communications and media software and services provider Amdocs has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Vubiquity, a leading provider of premium content services and technology solutions, subject to customary closing conditions. The two companies say they are excited about the […]

January 31, 2018

Spanish telcos raise convergent tariffs

Telefónica, Vodafone and Orange are hiking the prices of their convergent packages in an attempt to get higher revenues. The combination of low cost promotions and the high bill they’re paying for football TV rights is driving them down a dead end in terms of profitability.  To mitigate this, they increasing prices by up to […]

January 31, 2018From David Del Valle in Madrid

APAC pay-TV revenue up 4% in 2017

Research on the pay-TV channel ecosystem shows India powering revenue and profit growth for regional pay-TV broadcasters in Asia Pacific. Revenue for pay-TV channel groups owned by global media companies expanded by 4 per cent in 2017 to reach around $5 billion (€4bn) across the region, while EBITDA grew 9 per cent Y/Y to reach […]

January 31, 2018

beIN Sports fined over Nilesat switch

Egypt is one of the countries aligned with Saudi Arabia which as broken off diplomatic and commercial relations with Qatar. January 30th saw an Egyptian court order Nasser Al Khelaifi, CEO of the Qatari beIN Media Group, to pay a fine of 400 million Egyptian pounds (€18.2m) on charges of the network’s “involvement in monopolistic […]

January 31, 2018By Chris Forrester

TimVision hits 1.5m subs in first year

Italian operator TIM has celebrated the first year of its VoD service TimVision with 1.5 million subscribers. According to TimVision chairman, Daniela Biscarini, the customer base has grown by over 60 per cent from the end of 2016. Most of them have been acquired thanks to the Tim Smart offer that includes TimVision at no […]

January 31, 2018From Branislav Pekic in Rome

20 VR/AR projects for new programme boosting sector

Digital Catapult and Arts Council England have announced the 20 CreativeXR teams to watch out for in 2018, as they receive support in developing innovative immersive prototypes and projects. CreativeXR is a new programme enabling the UK’s arts and cultural sector to lead the field in immersive content creation and digital innovation. These CreativeXR teams […]

January 31, 2018

Mobile drives UK adspend growth

The UK’s ad market reached a new milestone during the third quarter of 2017 as almost one in four pounds spent on advertising went to mobile, which posted year-on-year growth of 30.7 per cent to £1.3 billion (€1.48bn), according to Advertising Association/WARC Expenditure Report data. Total ad market growth was recorded at 3.5 per cent […]

January 31, 2018

Samsung enjoys profits boom; Splits stock

South Korea’s electronics giant Samsung reported record quarterly profits on January 30th saying strong demand for memory chips and sales of high-end displays and components for the iPhone X helped drive revenues forward. The Board of Directors of the company approved a 50:1 stock split. Samsung is the world’s largest memory chipmaker for smartphones. Net […]

January 31, 2018By Chris Forrester

Avanti under financial pressure

London-based speciality satellite operator Avanti Communications has issued a trading update for the quarter-year to September 30th 2017. Revenue for the quarter was $9.7 million ($18 million same period a year ago) and EBITDA was negative -$3.8 million. The period end cash balance was $90.0 million ($43.1 million a year ago) and the period end […]

January 31, 2018By Chris Forrester

OTT global comms market to grow to €32bn by 2021

According to IDATE DigiWorld, The OTT global communication market will grow to €32 billion by 2021. The market is composed of three segments: VoIP (such as Skype), IP messaging (such as WhatsApp), and also a share of social networking advertising revenues. In contrast to the telco communications market, however, the OTT communications market remains very […]

January 31, 2018