A senior Saudi Culture and Information Ministry official has announced plans to license private satellite television channels in the Kingdom. “The regulatory process in the media sector will be complete with the licensing of private satellite channels,” said Riyad bin Kamal Najm, chairman of the Commission for Audio and Visual Media. Speaking at Riyadh Chamber […]
The number of pay-TV subscribers in Western Europe increased by 1 million in 2012 to 94.1 million, and will climb by another million in 2013, according to a report from Digital TV Research. This comes despite pay-TV subscriptions falling in Italy (down by 482,000) and Spain (down by 350,000) in 2012. Italy and Spain will […]
SES-6, a new satellite serving South and North America, as well as Europe, was only launched on June 4th but is already proving a commercial success. SES says it has sold a large slice of the craft’s available capacity to a Brazilian DTH operator, ‘Oi’ as part of a “significant long-term capacity agreement”. The ‘Oi’ […]
Nigeria’s Copyright Commission has supplied evidence against a number of local TV pirates responsible for relaying DStv signals to around 500 homes in the town of Ikot Ekpene in Akwa Ibom State. Mr Ubong Obot has been arrested and charged with illegally transmitting the broadcast signals of MultiChoice/DStv. Obot was allegedly installing kit for a […]
A flawless launch on June 3rd followed some 15 hours later by its final 31-minute booster firing saw the SES-6 satellite placed into its super-synchronous transfer orbit (SSTO) by a Proton rocket fitted with the Briz-M booster. International Launch Services (ILS) handled the flight. SES-6 is a 6-tonnes satellite which will serve North and South […]
Space Systems/Loral has won a two-satellite order from AsiaSat of Hong Kong. AsiaSat 6 and AsiaSat 8 will be financed by a $343 million loan from the Export-Import Bank of the United States. The initial contract was announced back in November 2011 and the satellites are already being built with planned launches in the first-half […]
To facilitate a global comparison of the world’s largest video and broadband providers, media and communications analysis specialist SNL Kagan has compiled a database of 106 major operators serving no fewer than 2 million video subscribers or 1 million fixed-line broadband subscribers at year-end 2012. The findings reveal that geographically, China, India and the US […]
The Middle East’s latest HDTV initiative was launched officially in Dubai on May 30th. MyHD is offering a bouquet of HD channels at an ultra-low cost, and is partnering with Arabsat which is hosting the bouquet. New channels announced on the Arabsat platform are MTV Lebanon, Luxe.TV, Physique TV (which will also be available in […]
Mohamed Youssif, until last week CEO at YahLive, has joined Asia Broadcast Satellite (ABS) as its COO and president/MD of a newly formed Middle East division. A press statement from ABS says that Youssif will be responsible “for global sales and revenue for the company as well as directly managing business development for the Middle […]
International Launch Services (ILS) is making final preparations to launch SES-6 into orbit. The launch is scheduled for June 3rd. ILS uses the Proton+Breeze-M booster combination for the launch from the Baikonur, Kazakhstan cosmodrome. SES-6 will replace NSS-806 at 40.5 degrees West, and serve North America, Latin America and the Caribbean islands. Other transponders will […]