Chris Forrester is one of the most experienced and highly regarded journalists in the field. His insight and analysis, particularly in the satellite and pay-TV arena, is highly prized. He has written for all the major business journals in the sector as well as several national newspapers.
Middle East Broadcasting’s (MBC) CEO Sam Barnett says that his region is already home to about 1000 channels, many of them small and serving local audiences, but that it could absorb “several thousands more”. He said 100 were launched last year, about 43 in Kurdish alone. “There are lots more to come,” he added. Indeed, […]
Mexican broadcaster and media giant Grupo Televisa has lost its 18-point series of appeals against an earlier decision that it held a dominant position in Mexican media. Back in March the Mexican Federal Telecommunications Institute (IFT) ruled that Televisa was in breach of the 50 per cent market share threshold, and needed to curb its […]
Ratings agency Fitch doubts that electronics giant Sony can turn around the struggling fortunes of its mobile phone division. Sony says it will launch even ‘smarter’ so-called smartphones and a new range of high-end consumer devices. But the news might be a last throw of the dice and follows on from a massive Sony write-down […]
Getting anything decided, let alone implemented, is a near-nightmare. India’s Information & Broadcasting Ministry has decided to again set new dates for the implementation of its Digital Addressable Systems ruling, to December 2015 for Phase II cities and the following year, December 2016, for Phase IV smaller cities and towns. The existing rules (issued in […]
It was while browsing BSkyB’s September 5th prospectus on the raising of £10 billion in fresh financing (the £10 billion Euro Medium Term Note Programme) that it dawned on me: Sky should dump its advertising segments. The fact is that all the Sky channel ads, all the interruptions, all the commercials for ambulance chasing lawyers, […]
Charlie Ergen’s EchoStar and Luxembourg-based SES are continuing their close working relationship with the addition of a new satellite at 105 degrees West. The new craft will have two names. EchoStar will call it EchoStar 105 while SES will dub the craft SES-11. Airbus will build the satellite and it will launch quite soon in […]
On August 22nd two Galileo/GPS satellites were placed into a useless orbit. Now, an Israeli company is suggesting it can build a micro-satellite which would – in effect – rescue the two Galileo craft. Effective Space Solutions, based in Tel Aviv, says its DeOrbiter proposed rescue satellite could save not only these two Galileo satellites, […]
September 2nd sees the first of BSkyB’s financial roadshow presentations take place with the aim of raising the extra cash it needs to buy Sky Deutschland and Sky Italia. Financial reports suggest that BSkyB is looking to raise $2 billion. Last week BSkyB mandated three banks (Barclays, JP Morgan and Morgan Stanley) to lead the […]
Pay-TV operator StarTimes Group is potentially in hot water in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), StarTimes is extremely active with subscription TV in Africa and is stuck in the middle of a political dispute between two senior politicians in the country. On the one hand there’s the head of the Congo’s Post & Telecoms […]
Eutelsat and Intelsat are being given permission by the USA State Department to carry Iranian satellite channels. The two satellite operators were previously barred from carrying the channels in 2012, and the Iranians quickly reorganised their broadcasting with Russian and Middle East broadcasters picking up the contracts. Now the State Department says Eutelsat and Intelsat […]
Channel 4 to carry UKTV’s U streaming service
ITVX Premium now on Prime Video UK
Survey: Third of consumers considering switching ISPs
Research: US streaming audiences riding nostalgia wave
Study: In-game ads drive action, but measurement standards lag
Project Kuiper KF-03 batch readies for launch
Comscore, TiVo measurement collaboration
FCC wants progress on ATSC 3.0 TV
ITV launches GenAI Ads Manager
Rakuten TV Enterprise powers 3 studios’ first FAST launches