Advanced Television

Business

Naspers dragged down by Tencent

Shares in Naspers, the South African media group that owns nearly a third of Tencent, fell as much as 10 per cent after the Chinese internet company posted a dip in profits. Tencent said that profit in the second quarter was RMB 17.9 billion (€2.3bn), down 2 per cent year-on-year and missing expectations of RMB […]

August 15, 2018

Avanti gets Indonesian cash

Avanti Communications, at long last, has received $20 million in a Court-awarded settlement against the government of Indonesia. The payment is no great surprise although the Indonesians were reported to be considering an appeal against the arbitration ruling. Avanti, in its formal statement, said: “[We] confirm that, in accordance with its announcement made on July […]

August 15, 2018By Chris Forrester

YouTube bans horror trailer

YouTube has pulled a five-second teaser trailer for upcoming horror movie The Nun after a number of users complained that it was too frightening. The trailer was essentially a jump-scare tactic similar to the prank videos that were popular in the early days of YouTube, where users would be asked to focus on a small […]

August 15, 2018By Nik Roseveare

Italy to switch from MPEG-2 to MPEG-4

Italy will switch from the MPEG-2 coding in favour of MPEG-4 on the DVB-T standard from January 1st 2020. This decision is included in the schedule for the release of the 700 MHz band, published by the Ministry of Economic Development. The rationale for the adoption of the MPEG-4 format is to enable more efficient […]

August 14, 2018From Branislav Pekic in Rome

Kudelski sell SmarDTV to Neotion

Digital security specialist the Kudelski Group, and Neotion, a provider of secure solutions for the pay-TV industry, have reached an agreement whereby Kudelski’s SmarDTV’s Conditional Access Module (CAM) and set-top box businesses are transferred to SmarDTV Global, a newly established entity affiliated with Neotion. Upfront cash consideration for the transaction amounts to $20 million (€17.26m), […]

August 14, 2018By Colin Mann

DISH Network hurt by negative report

Equity analysts at MoffettNathanson (MN) have downgraded DISH Network with a “Sell” note to investors, which caused a near-immediate 5 per cent fall in the pay-TV broadcaster’s share price. Worse, perhaps, its new target price for DISH is a miserable $29 (currently it’s $35.17 after its fall on August 10th). A year ago, they were […]

August 14, 2018

Taiwan: Industry, government anti-piracy co-operation

Taiwan’s leading video-on-demand (VoD) industry associations have come together with the government at a roundtable event to share and promote best practices that foster growth while safeguarding consumer interests through self-regulation and collaborating on anti-piracy efforts. The event was hosted by the Asia Video Industry Association (AVIA), the Asia Pacific trade association for the video […]

August 14, 2018By Colin Mann

Veritone to acquire Wazee Digital

Veritone has signed an agreement to acquire Wazee Digital, a provider of cloud-native video management and licensing services that enable rights holders to monetise and enrich their content. Veritone, the SaaS-based operating system for Artificial Intelligence (AI), will offer the Wazee Digital applications and services into the Media and Entertainment as well as Government markets, providing […]

August 14, 2018

Netflix CFO leaves

Netflix’s chief financial officer David Wells is stepping down after seven years. Wells, who has been at the company since 2004 and CFO since December 2010, will stay with the company until a successor takes over. “After discussing my desire to make a change with Reed (CEO), we agreed that with Netflix’s strong financial position […]

August 13, 2018

Disney; it’s direct or die

Disney is the ultimate media brand and a genuine giant that is determined to be ever bigger with the takeover of 21C Fox. And many parts of the empire are still money machines. But it was a new and very small part of the group that drew some attention in the results. ESPN+ is symbolic […]

August 13, 2018