Not everything in the BSkyB garden is rosy, implies Sarah Simon, media analyst at Berenberg Bank. She says that there’s much to worry about in the broadcaster’s latest quarterly numbers, and in fact maintains a ‘SELL’ note anticipating a fall in BSkyB’s share price. One of her observations concerns Sky’s ARPU which she says has […]
Satellite operator SES has borrowed €500 million by way of a 5 year bond. Proceeds will be used to pay down existing debt. The borrowing, at 1.875 per cent, is the lowest-ever charge in the company’s history, which reflect both the current state of the debt market and also confidence in SES. SES said “The […]
BSkyB’s Q1 numbers are out on Thursday and all eyes will be looking for the impact of BT Sports and its competitive challenge to Sky. Investment bank Berenberg, in a report to clients, say that while the market has been well aware of the competition from BT, “the actual effect on BSkyB numbers will only […]
Turkey will now launch a new satellite – Türksat 5A – in 2016, said Binali Yildirim, Minister for Transportation and Communication. The relatively small 16 Ku-band transponder satellite (plus 4 C-band transponders) is being built by Turkish Aerospace Industries (TAI) and Mitsubishi Electric and construction of the satellite will start next year. The 2016 launch […]
Much of the recent focus on India’s cable operators has been concentrated on the complex – and often troubled – conversion from analogue to digital. However, October 10th saw regulators pounce on 32 smaller Local Cable Operators (LCOs) and closed them down completely. It seems that none of the 32 LCOs have paid their entertainment […]
3D is the dog that didn’t bark. Bringing pictures ‘to life’ was to bring (another) renaissance to movie theatres and provide another whole new replacement market for big screen TVs. Avatar, James Anderson’s 2009 blockbuster about persecuted blue humanoid alien forest dwellers, was to be the start of something big and game changing. It turned […]
There may still be questions over a less than perfect demonstration flight of the SpaceX Falcon-9 rocket on Sept 29 but nevertheless SES has shipped its huge SES-8 satellite to Florida in readiness for its launch. SES-8 was transported by truck from its manufacturing site at Orbital Sciences in Dulles, Virginia, to SpaceX’s processing site […]
Billionaire Elon Musk’s SpaceX Corporation is due to use its all-new Falcon-9 rocket to launch SES-8 for SES of Luxembourg later this month. The problem is that the rocket’s test flight on September 29th failed to correctly fire up its upper stage. SES is concerned because without the all-important ‘second burn’ the rocket could leave […]
At 3.38am local time on September 30th, a giant Russian Proton rocket successfully launched Astra 2E for SES of Luxembourg. The launch should have taken place many weeks ago, but all activity on the Russian cosmodrome was halted following a July 2nd disaster when a similar Proton rocket went awry. But behind the scenes there […]
A Spanish newspaper, in an Editorial, is extremely critical of Eutelsat’s dealings with Madrid-based Hispasat and in particular Eutelsat’s successful bid for the SatMex company in Mexico which they allege was carried out to the detriment of Hispasat – in which Eutelsat is also a shareholder. The article in El Confidencial accuses Eutelsat of “double […]