France’s Canal + is augmenting its 3D service with the promise of one blockbuster movie and a top-flight football match each month from March. Kicking off on February 12 with live coverage of the English Premier League clash between rivals Manchester United and Manchester City, future games will feature leading French teams, as well as […]
The UK Competition Commission probe into BSkyB finds it has “consistently” earned “excess profits” on its Sky Movies packages, that’s the conclusion of a working paper published on its website. It says that while some of Sky’s excess profits may be due to innovation or competitor weakness, “we would not expect such profits to persist […]
Three men have been charged with defrauding TV giant Virgin Media of up to £40 million (€47.6m). The trio have been accused of importing 44,000 digital receivers which could be made to pick up channels without paying a fee to Virgin. The Crown Prosecution Service said the boxes would be sent electronic messages which would […]
Sky’s business model creates a “virtuous circle” that aids the broadcaster’s ability to innovate, according to COO Mike Darcey. He told the Broadcasting Press Guild that “more content investment is going in. It’s being done in a way that drives subscriber acquisition and retention. That in turn drives revenue forward, which in turn provides more […]
BSkyB COO Mike Darcey implied the broadcaster and Virgin Media are still some way apart on price as they negotiate a carriage fee for the new Sky Atlantic channel. Darcey said “I think it was offered at a very reasonable price,” but clearly Virgin disagree. Sky Atlantic launched on satellite on February 1st, offering a […]
Brazilian telecoms regulator Anatel says the country now has 9.76 million homes with pay TV (as of December 31st), which represents a dramatic year-on-year growth of 30.7 per cent. During December almost 238,000 net new subscribers were added, which meant a 2.5 per cent rise against November. At the end of 2009 there were 7.47 […]
The European Court of Justice has been advised that BSkyB (and other pay operators across Europe) or rights holders cannot stop pubs (or anyone else) subscribing to foreign TV channels no matter they may carry programmes that another broadcaster has the domestic rights to. The immediate implication is that BSkyB and the English Premier League […]
Pace has confirmed it is working to agree contract terms with a satellite operator for the launch of a new digital service in India. Reports suggest Pace is working on a set-top box for Tata Sky, a joint venture between Indian conglomerate Tata and News International-owned Star TV.
TeliaSonera added 49,000 subscribers to its pay-TV services in the fourth quarter of 2010 to reach a total of 935,000. The Nordic telco reported that 40 per cent of its broadband customers in Sweden now take its TV services, and over the course of 2010 over 2 million VOD rentals were sold, compared with 1.2 […]
In the past few days, Sky Deutschland (SD) has resolved a troubling legal dispute with former investors by settling $20 million on them, and also seen News Corp’s Rupert Murdoch say last week that his investment in the German pay-TV operator was “starting to pay off”. A week ago, SD raised €165 million via a […]