Advanced Television

Inside Satellite

Chris Forrester

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.

SES approves “I still love you” success

Elon Musk might just have gone through another – probably expensive – divorce for the second time with one of his wives, but he has definitely maintained his sense of humour. His SpaceX rocket ship’s important first stage successfully landed onto a floating barge on April 8th. The humour was that the barge had a […]

April 12, 2016

Landing success for SpaceX

Billionaire Elon Musk’s scheme to dramatically slash prices for launching satellites into space came much closer on April 8th when a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket successfully landed onto a floating barge after delivering a cargo up to the International Space Station. The mission is key to Musk’s plans. This is the first time SpaceX has […]

April 11, 2016

Ariane: ‘We’ll beat SpaceX on price’

The first launch of the new design Ariane 6 rocket is still four to five years away (planned first flight currently in 2020), but French government and industry officials said April 6th that the new rocket would beat arch-rival SpaceX on a price-per-kilo basis. The bold statement came from Airbus Safran Launchers (ASL), the newly-established […]

April 8, 2016

UK telco merger “positive” for Sky

Various press reports suggest that Hutchison is close to signing a £3 billion capacity agreement as part of its plan to buy the O2 cellular network from Telefonica. The reports say that Sky will pay around £2 billion for 20 per cent of the capacity, and Virgin Media will pay to acquire a 10 percent […]

April 7, 2016

Sea Launch asset sale “blocked”

The sale of the struggling Sea Launch rocket launch enterprise has been blocked by minority shareholder Boeing. Boeing has started a legal action in California, seeking to obtain an injunction to halt the proposed sale, arguing that it wants payments contracted with a former partner of Sea Launch, the Energia rocket building business. Russia’s Roscosmos […]

April 6, 2016

SPS/RR Media: Deal explained

On February 26th SES announced that its SES Platform Services (SPS) division would be acquiring Tel Aviv-based RR Media for about $242 million ($13.29 a share). The agreement is expected to close during the next few months, and without presuming too much both RR Media boss Avi Cohen and SPS CEO Wilfried Urner are planning […]

April 4, 2016

2016: The year for 4K

The huge MIPTV programming market in Cannes this coming week (April 4-7) will see three days of intense focus on 4K/UHD programming. Indeed, it is now clear that 2016 is likely to be the year when 4K does begin to break through to viewers around the world. The constant stream of positive news for 4K […]

April 1, 2016

Broadcom in SpaceX dispute

Semiconductor and chipset developer Broadcom has started legal proceedings against Elon Musk’s rocket-company SpaceX, alleging that Musk’s business has violated NDA’s that existed between the two companies and SpaceX is further accused of “raiding its employees” in order to gain proprietary information. The action has been filed in Orange County Superior Court, and commenced on […]

March 30, 2016

SES: “Not dead yet”

The satellite sector has had a torrid time lately, not helped by a lack of confidence with investors over Intelsat’s position. Intelsat’s troubled status – as far as the stock market is concerned – has also affected the share positions at SES and Eutelsat. Equity analysts at Berenberg Bank, in a strong “BUY” note to […]

March 29, 2016

beIN problems for Canal Plus?

A French TV report says that the recent agreement between Vivendi and sports rights-holder beIN Sport, and which sees Canal Plus gaining access to some of beIN’s sports events, is going to extremely expensive for Canal Plus Group. Canal Plus is paying beIN more than €300 million annually for access to beIN’s rights, with Canal […]

March 24, 2016