Spain’s largest cable company ONO has asked the Telecommunications Market Commission (CMT) to give it back an amount of €8.3 million paid as a tax to the state-owned broadcaster RTVE over the last three years. The operator argues that the current legislation that obliges telco companies to dedicate 0.9 per cent of their revenues to financing the broadcaster is unconstitutional [...]
Within a week of BT announcing plans to offer free sports channels, including live Premier League football games to its broadband customers, 15 per cent of Sky’s TV and broadband customers say they are interested in receiving them, according to a nationwide survey by Usurv. Six per cent of existing Sky TV customers revealed they will consider terminating their Sky [...]
BSkyB subscribers who are HDTV viewers and paying for a Sky+ set-top box are receiving documents and e-mails telling them that from now on they can watch 3D transmissions and have ‘free’ access to Sky’s Formula 1 coverage as part of their core subscription. The messages are part of BSkyB’s fight back over the threat from BT Sport offers which [...]
BT’s pay-TV customer base increased by 40,000 to hit 810,000 in the last quarter with growth rates outpacing Virgin and Sky. Total group revenues for the quarter dipped 2 per cent to £4.785 billion (€5.9bn) while full-year profits climbed 2 per cent to £6.18 billion on annual revenues down 5 per cent at £18.25 billion. BT’s high-profile entry into broadcasting [...]
Confirming earlier speculation, BT has revealed that customers to its broadband packages – not just its superfast BT Infinity product – will receive free English Premier League football when the telco launches its BT Sport channels in time for the start of the 2013-14 season. The telco also revealed it had reached agreement with BSkyB for its DTH satellite customers [...]
Deutsche Telekom’s operating profit fell 4.3 per cent in the first quarter, as it invested in its major markets in Europe. First-quarter EBITDA, excluding exceptionals, came in at €4.29 billion. Deutsche Telekom said investments came to more than €3 billion in the first quarter, up almost 40 per cent from last year, mainly on the acquisition of mobile spectrum in [...]
Spanish telco Telefonica has revamped its IPTV platform, Movistar TV with the addition of a more innovative and user-friendly interface and expanded content line-up with emphasis on HD channels (with an offer of up to 18 HD channels) in an attempt to tackle the constant loss of subscribers. In the first quarter of the year, the company lost 51,000 subscribers to [...]
BT is set to give free access to its new sports channel showing live Premier League football to a million subscribers who take its high-speed fibre optic broadband service. The telco will unveil details of the plan on May 10th when it reveals full-year figures, likely to show profits up five per cent to £2.5billion (€3bn) for the year to [...]
Swiss telco Swisscom has reported net revenues fell 2.4 per cent in the first quarter as record customer growth failed to offset weakening market prices. First quarter net profits fell 12.4 per cent to 390 million Swiss francs ($420.3 million). Swisscom TV connections increased by 205,000 (31.3 per cent) year-on-year to 860,000. Meanwhile, Swisscom has increased its stake in Cinetrade [...]
Telco and pay-TV giant America Movil is to merge its Brazilian operations. Local director Daniel Hajj says the Mexican-owned company will consolidate its DTH, cable TV and cellular subsidiaries. America Movil owns the Embratel DTH system, Net Servicos (cable) and Claro mobile phone business, and Hajj says the operation will take between 18 and 30 months to switch the various [...]
