Satellite operator Intelsat has successfully exchanged some $403.3 million (€380.9m) of debt, due for repayment in 2018, for new higher interest-bearing Notes that will now fall due in 2024. The $403 million accepted and re-issued represents 80.7 per cent of the 2018 debt (at 6.75 per cent) on offer. The other remaining debt-holders have until […]
Mexico’s giant multimedia broadcaster Televisa will increase its stake in Univision. Univision is the main Spanish-language network broadcaster in the US. Normally, the FCC regulator limits the stake that can be held by any foreign broadcaster in a US network to 25 per cent. Televisa had asked the FCC to be permitted to increase its […]
Pay-radio broadcaster SiriusXM has exceeded its own guidance for its 2016 expectations in terms of subscribers. However, comments from SiriusXM’s CFO David Frear, speaking at a Citigroup financial conference on January 5th, said he had “doubts” as to any possible move on music streaming site Pandora. Shares in Pandora had moved ahead during December on […]
Satellite Solutions Worldwide Group (SSW), the global communications company specialising in rural and last mile broadband, has agreed a new commercial contract with one of its key suppliers of satellite capacity, SES Techcom Services. The contract means improved commercial terms on existing business, plus new satellite broadband capacity to support SSW’s strong ongoing sales in […]
As of January 1st, the sale of TV sets with DVB-T/MPEG-2 or MPEG-4 encoding is no longer allowed in Italy. Retailers can market only TV sets with tuner compatible with the new second-generation digital terrestrial standard DVBT-2/HEVC, which allows for more efficient use of frequencies by an estimated 30 per cent compression of the signal. […]
Investment by new digital services such as Spotify, Sky, Amazon, Apple Music and Google has resulted in sales of music, video and games running £1 billion ahead of where they were just four years ago, according to data compiled by the Entertainment Retailers Association (ERA). Preliminary figures from ERA indicate that booming digital services helped […]
Viewers in Italy using the Tivùsat TV platform that broadcasts from Eutelsat’s HOTBIRD neighbourhood can now watch a full line-up of HD channels from Rai. Tivùsat was set up to ensure that everyone in Italy has access to free digital TV. By reaching all areas of Italian territory, viewers can access all national DTT channels […]
Multichannel broadcaster UKTV is predicting it will register record-breaking growth in share of commercial impacts (SOCI) across the last 12 months. UKTV is projecting 7.7 per cent growth of its SOCI to a record year-end high of 9.87 per cent, putting it ahead of Channel 5’s full portfolio and all of Sky’s wholly-owned channels (including movies […]
Premium entertainment streaming service Hulu has agreed a comprehensive deal with CBS Corporation to carry America’s most-watched broadcast network, CBS, as well as popular sports and entertainment channels CBS Sports Network and POP, with the potential to add additional networks in the future. All networks in the deal will be available to stream live, with […]
Figures released by the British Association for Screen Entertainment (BASE) based on data from The Official Charts Company and IHS Markit show that consumer spend in the video category rose by 2.2 per cent in 2016 bringing the total value of the category to £2.25 billion (€2.63bn). While ownership remains vital to the category and […]