SES, one of the world’s largest commercial satellite operators, suffered a decline in earnings in the first quarter after last year’s switch-off of analogue transmissions to Germany. However the company retained its full-year outlook SES, which sells transmission capacity to the likes of BSkyB and India’s Dish TV, said core profit (EBITDA) dropped 4.8 per cent to €321.2 million. SES [...]
Dubai-based My-HD is launching a low-cost all-HD bundle of 20 channels exclusively using Arabsat and with the aim of dramatically undercutting the prices charged by the Middle East’s existing pay-TV bouquets of OSN, Al Jazeera Sports and Abu Dhabi Sports. CEO Cliff Nelson, who was until recently SVP-Operations & Platform Development at OSN, and had previously held senior positions at [...]
A flawless lift-off and a 9 hour launch process onboard a Proton-Breeze M rocket saw the successful launch of a new Eutelsat satellite to the 3 degrees East position. The satellite is built by Thales Alenia Space and lift-off from the Baikonur launch site took place on May 14th at 16.02 GMT. Some 12 hours after launch a partial deployment [...]
Charlie Ergen’s Dish Network is raising $2.5 billion in fresh debt. The cash will be placed into a special escrow account ready to be used for Dish’s proposed purchase of US cellular giant Sprint Nextel. Ergen said that week that he would only make a firm financing commitment when it was clear that it was teh last obstacle in keeping [...]
The latest results of the survey produced by Eutelsat and Ipsos on TV reception modes and trends in Russia underscore the dynamic of its satellite broadcasting market and the stellar growth of homes watching channels broadcast from the longstanding 36° East neighbourhood. Of the 53 million TV homes in Russia, 24 per cent are equipped for DTH satellite reception, making [...]
India’s fast-growing DTH sector shows no sign of slowing down. The latest player to declare their numbers is Reliance Digital TV, which says that it now has 4.6 million subscribers (as at March 31st), which is 8 per cent of India’s DTH market. Reliance is one of the smaller players in the market. India’s TRAI regulator says that the country [...]
Latino media giant Claro has lost its DTH licence in Uruguay. The licence has been revoked, according to the country’s Minister of Industry, Roberto Kreimerman. Claro, a subsidiary of America Movil, had anticipated starting its DTH broadcasting services shortly, and is now threatening a “multi-million dollar” lawsuit on the government. The government action is reportedly based on concerns over the [...]
Madrid-based satellite operator Hispasat used its giant Amazonas 3 satellite to beam 4K Ultra-HDTV signals into Brazil. The test signals went to – at least one – 84” LG receiver at an event in Rio to help celebrate the coming into use of the new Amazonas 3 satellite. Hispasat hasd earlier trialled 4K/Ultra HDTV at the Mobile World Congress Event [...]
HD+, the encrypted high-definition service for Germany, is making progress. SES’s latest numbers to March 31st, say that it now has 1.1 million subscribers, up 158, 768 since December 31st (when the total stood at 944,933). Expressed as a percentage this represents growth of 17 per cent during the quarter-year. The growth means that the subscriber base has doubled in [...]
International Launch Services (ILS), the Russian-backed system that launches satellites from Kazakhstan, says it has received a launch order from EchoStar to place a massive satellite into orbit. The unspecified craft weighs some 6,900 kgs, which places it amongst the heaviest communications satellites ever launched. The satellite will be due for launch during the winter of 2015-16. Industry observers reckon [...]
