Sky Italia denies pay-TV on DTT plans
October 18, 2010
From Branislav Pekic in Rome
Sky Italia does not intend to enter the DTT market with a pay-TV offer, claiming this would be technically impossible. It was refuting allegations in dialy “Corriere della Sera” which claimed that Sky Italia plans to team up with local media group Espresso as part of an “anti-Mediaset deal”.
Sky Italia points out that it broadcasts over 190 encrypted TV channels, including 36 in HD (due to increase to 50 soon) on satellite and offers many advanced features guaranteed by the mySky decoder, adding that the bandwidth availability on DTT would make such an offer “technically impossible”.
However, the broadcaster does not exclude that its free-to-air DTT channel Cielo could expand its offering with one or two additional channels by leasing the necessary frequencies on the market.