Channel 4 has taken a minority stake in new British virtual reality (VR) business Parable, focussing on innovative content creation with storytelling at its heart. Launched this month, Parable will create VR and 360° content across the entertainment, brand marketing and training sectors. Parable is co-founded by former director of programmes at The Garden Productions, […]
Karen Bradley, the UK Culture Secretary, has launched a Digital Strategy designed to create a world-leading digital economy that works for everyone, with skills, infrastructure and innovation at its heart. It backs the UK digital sectors to invest for the long term and includes measures to help all businesses harness the productivity benefits of digital […]
ITV, the UK commercial broadcaster, has reported a 14 per cent fall in annual pre-tax profits to £553 million (€649.1m) as advertising revenues declined by 3 per cent. ITV said it continued to rebalance and strengthen the business and blamed “wider political and economic uncertainty” for advertising falls. It wasn’t all bad news however, with […]
FCC Chairman Ajit Pai, a known critic of the Obama administration’s ‘Open Internet’ network neutrality proposals, has signalled a reversal of such policies, which he described – without naming the principle – as “heavy-handed decrees inspired by the distant past”. Delivering a keynote address at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Pai told delegates he […]
The post-announcement comments of the SoftBank-engineered merger between Intelsat and OneWeb are coming in, and they are not all favourable. For example, Sami Kassab, an equity analyst at investment bank Exane/BNP-Paribas, while praising Intelsat’s results said there are still major risks to the deal, not least Intelsat’s existing bondholders agreeing to a severe financial haircut […]
Beleaguered satellite operator Avanti Communications saw a 10 per cent fall in its share price on February 28th, down to an all-time historic ‘low’ of 16.6p on the London Stock Exchanges ‘Alternate’ bourse. At one point the price hit 16.25p. February 28th also saw London-based Avanti issue its latest results for the half-year to December […]
Japan’s telco giant SoftBank is the catalyst in bringing together old-established Intelsat and embryonic satellite operator OneWeb, into a merger. In essence, the agreement sees SoftBank inject $1.7 billion (€1.6bn) of new equity into debt-heavy Intelsat. At the end of 2016, SoftBank invested $1 billion into Jersey, Channel Islands-based OneWeb. Intelsat was already a minor investor […]
Sony Pictures Networks India (SPN) and its affiliates have completed the first phase of a two-phase acquisition of the TEN Sports Network from Zee Entertainment Enterprises (ZEE) and its subsidiaries. Following the completion of this phase of the acquisition, SPN’s cluster of nine sports channels will now include: Sony SIX, Sony Six HD, Sony ESPN, […]
Over two million people who buy only a landline telephone service from BT would see their monthly bills cut by at least £5 per month, under plans announced by UK comms regulator Ofcom. Ofcom has reviewed how the market is working for customers who buy only a landline service from a provider – either because […]
The UK’s Intellectual Property Office (IPO) is calling for views on whether there is any need for legislative change to deal with the issue of illicit IPTV streaming devices. According to the IPO, the use of IPTV boxes to access illegal content appears to have increased in recent months. Such boxes were originally designed to allow […]