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.
Investors loved the news that Sky Deutschland (Sky-D) had secured the next four seasons of satellite and cable coverage of Germany’s pay-TV bundesliga soccer rights. Early morning trading on Wednesday April 18 continued the Tuesday boost, which saw Sky-D’s share price rise more than 20 per cent. Deutsche Telekom gets nothing, nor does Al Jazeera. […]
Investment banker Morgan Stanley, in a note to clients, says that last week’s admission by BSkyB that a journalist on its Sky News team hacked into certain emails with the knowledge and approval of Sky News’ then managing editor, ought to have “limited ramifications” for the broadcaster. The bank says that while the action was […]
North Korea’s entry into the world’s portfolio of rocket launch suppliers failed early Friday April 13, when its rocket blew up around 60 to 90 seconds into its satellite launching mission. The Unha-3 rocket failed despite North Korea’s confidence that – this time – everything would go well. Indeed, it was so confident of success […]
Bahrain is threatening to quit the Arabsat satellite consortium, unhappy that Arabsat has, in its view, failed to take down certain channels that are broadcasting content not to Bahrain’s liking. Satellite operator Arabsat is owned by a consortium of Arab telecommunications companies, mostly themselves owned by their governments. Bahrain says Arabsat is “failing to take […]
Elon Musk, the wealthy owner of rocket launch company SpaceX, is considering building a new satellite launch site in southern Texas, south of Corpus Christi, and almost on the Mexican Border. The plans call for a launch site to be built near Brownsville in Cameron County (and specifically south of Port Isabel). Musk’s company has […]
Journalist, BBC commentator and founding Chairman of BSkyB forerunner Sky TV Andrew Neil, addressing SES Astra’s annual Satellite Monitor unveiling, gave some valuable clues as to how the current News Corporation/BSkyB ownership predicament might unfold. ‘First, the Murdochs have to go,’ Neil implied. He explained that the current 39 per cent News Corp ownership position […]
Last week, peace broke out for the briefest of moments in the never-ending patent battles over TiVo’s IP. Last week, it was with Microsoft where TiVo and Microsoft “settled their differences” although no further details were released. Now, however, a fresh batch of writs has been issued against media heavyweights Motorola Mobility and Time Warner […]
Casbaa’s special India Forum, which took place earlier this week in New Delhi, saw some delegates express anxiety that India’s planned digitisation scheme could become bogged down in litigation. There were also grumbles that India’s recent budget had done nothing to benefit the cable industry by means of lowering duties on set-top boxes, or encouraging […]
Investment banker Morgan Stanley says that CEO Brian Sullivan and his fellow senior managers at Sky Deutschland are in a “positive mood” about current subscriber trends. Moreover, Sullivan said Sky Deutschland is “quietly confident” of winning access to the all-important Bundesliga football matches. Bidding for the Bundesliga opens in two weeks’ time, on April 2nd, […]
Around this time next year, Paris-based Eutelsat is due to orbit its powerful 6,000 kgs 25B satellite to the 25.5 degrees East position broadcasting to the Arab world. The trouble is that Saudi Arabian-based Arabsat already has a trio of satellite in the position (adjacent at 26 degrees East). Indeed, the Arabsat BADR-series are extremely […]
Survey: 45% say streaming experience is “overwhelming”
Data: Ad-supported subscriptions hit record high in UK
France: M6, TF1 partner with Amazon on targeted ads
Spain: Movistar Plus regains momentum
Research: Familiar IP key to driving kids’ consumption on Netflix
MPs express concern over BBC editorial standards
Survey: Consumers increasingly engaging across cinema and digital
Data: Streaming subscriptions reach 91% of US internet homes
Samsung hit with $191m patent fine
Rouge named Eutelsat CFO