On Friday evening (Aug 26) Google boss Eric Schmidt delivered the annual MacTaggart lecture at the Edinburgh TV Festival. He confirmed that Google TV would launch in Europe early next year with the UK “among the top priorities”. One cautionary comment came from Stewart Purvis, a former CEO at ITN and now professor of […]
Telesat of Canada launched its Telstar 14R/Estrela do Sol 2 satellite on May 21st. While the launch appeared successful one of the satellite’s solar panels failed to open. The craft, built by Space Systems/Loral has been given a very limited life in orbit, and can only handle about half of its planned channels. The satellite […]
Pace is the world’s largest supplier of set-top box technology, having taken the top spot from rival Motorola a year or so ago. A story in Investors Chronicle also suggests that Pace’s market share could be threatened by the Google purchase. This past week has seen Pace’s FTSE London-listed share price recover somewhat from 92p […]
To misquote the old joke, Question: where does Googorola; the 800lb offspring of the Google buy of Motorola, sit in the media platform ecosystem? Answer: Anywhere it damn well pleases! Funny? Not really. True? Not really, but maybe a bit. Google has swept all before it in search, online advertising and now mobile, with Android […]
The BBC’s popular music radio station Radio 1 is again available for Sirius-XM listeners PROVIDED they are close to a computer or streaming service. The station will not be actually available on the Sirius-XM satellite or terrestrial repeater system other than for a few special events through the year. The BBC station rejoins the Sirius-XM […]
US DBS leader DirecTV is spending $100 million a week buying in its own shares. As at June 30 it had $3.4 billion of authorised cash available to buy back its shares, and according to ratings agency Fitch, it expects DirecTV’s capital allocation strategy will continue to focus on its share repurchase programme while managing […]
For some time now the signs for pay-TV growth have not been good. So-called ‘cord cutters’ who favour NetFlix, YouTube or other OTT suppliers seem to be getting the blame for pay-TV’s decline in subscribers. The Washington Post newspaper headlined the decline to a “toxic mix” of circumstances which have led to a net loss […]
The BBC’s Radio 1 has been dropped from the Sirius-XM pay-radio bouquet. Sirius has made no comment but it is understood that it was not that popular, although one source quoted the BBC saying they had ended their partnership with Sirius-XM. However, there is now a campaign from loyal US and Canadian listeners to […]
There are many thousands of UK residents who – at least so far – have been forbidden to have satellite dishes because of restrictive covenants on their homes or apartments. People living in so called ‘conservation areas’ and listed buildings are particularly limited in what they may fix to their homes. Those restrictions may now […]
It was a question from an analyst that prompted a rare note of indignation from BSkyB’s normally calm and collected CEO Jeremy Darroch. Asked whether BSkyB would continue to monitor the make-up of its board of directors, Darroch said it was quite ludicrous to suggest that News Corp was not a entity to hold a […]