Satellite News

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ITV Local to close

By Julian Clover | March 4, 2009 | 08:59 UK

ITV is to close its broadband delivered news and information service ITV Local. Instead the network will concentrate on its video on demand content including ITV.com.

ITV Local was launched in early 2007 after a year-long trial in the South East region. Its closure comes after the BBC Trust rejected separate plans for a local online video service that keeps the market in the hands of the increasing number of local newspapers building online video content.

Earlier this month ITV reduced its local output to nine regions following permission from the regulator Ofcom, saving the broadcaster £40 million in 2009. ITV is planning total cost savings of £155m in 2009, rising to £175m in 2010 and £245m in 2011. Drama production is being scaled back and the Leeds studios, responsible for the production of Heartbeat and The Royal are to close.

The broadcaster confirmed it would sell the online school reunion site Friends Reunited and that it was considering the options for the SDN terrestrial multiplex operator.

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ProSiebenSat.1 suffers from SBS write-off

By Robert Briel | March 4, 2009 | 08:45 UK

A write-off to the tune of €80 million has pushed the results of German based broadcasting giant ProSiebenSat.1 into the red. The broadcaster acquired SBS Broadcasting in 2007 for €3.3 billion.

Interest payments on loans associated with the SBS purchase also influenced the results of the company, whose regular TV business is under pressure.

The company said in a press statement: “The reduction in revenue is the result of problems with acceptance levels after the launch of a new sales model for the German TV advertising market. In addition, the economic uncertainty significantly reduced advertisers’ willingness to invest during the second half of the year, both in Germany – the Group’s core market – and in the rest of Europe.”

On the basis of preliminary figures for 2008, the ProSiebenSat.1 Group’s consolidated revenues came to €3.054 billion. Recurring EBITDA (EBITDA adjusted for one-time effects) reached €674.5 million. Reflecting the first full-year consolidation of SBS, revenue growth was equivalent to 12.7% (2007: €2.710 billion). This calculation includes the SBS business for the full year, with a contribution of €1.076 billion in revenues (July-December 2007: €547.0 million).

“I am taking office as CEO of a company that has shown great strength in difficult situations during 2008. Far-sighted business decisions have been made, and important operating and strategic goals have been achieved. The German family of stations increased its audience share significantly, in spite of the Olympics and the European Soccer Championships. The reorganization of German Free TV and the German Sales House will be completed successfully by mid-2009,” said Thomas Ebeling, CEO of ProSiebenSat.1, in a statement.

The major strategic goals included the reorganization of German Free TV and German Sales House; European playout center built; technical outsourcing and the sell-off of the Scandinavian C More premium TV operations.

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Portugal rejects bids for 5th channel

Portugal's broadcasting authority ERC has rejected the only two bids submitted in answer to the tender for the fifth free-to-air terrestrial TV broadcaster.
ZON Multimedia has had its bid rejected due to a lack of technical and human resources, the authority said. Mediaset's Spanish national private TV channel Telecinco has also had its bid rejected, in this case due to a lack of economic and financial viability, the ERC said.

The two bidding groups have now some eight days to answer the decision, with a final decision due to be taken at the end of this month.

Meanwhile, Portugal's DTH market registered growth of 4.5% in Q4 last year in relation to the previous quarter according to latest data from regulator ANACOM. The country's DTH market now stands at 21% of pay-TV.

In particular the Northen region leads the figures with 192,000 dishes followed by the Centre region with 169,000 and the Lisbon area with 66,000.

The study also highlights the decrease in cable subscribers, down 0.7% in relation to the previous quarter. And finally the report underlines a progression of 36% in the clients of other telecommunication technologies, especially fiber optic networks.

© Rapid TV News 2009

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Euronews adds Turkish from 2010

Euronews is to launch a Turkish-language version in January next year. Euronews is linking with Turkish Radio Television (TRT) and TRT will be a shareholder in the channel.


Euronews’ Turkish-language version is the ninth version on air over greater Europe. From the launch date, the news channel will be available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, on Euronews' satellite network all over the world to more than 253m households in 142 countries. Euronews will commercialize the new version to Turkish-speaking people around the world, particularly in neighbouring countries of Turkey: North of Cyprus, Caucasus and Central Asia, and also to Turkish communities in Europe especially in Germany.

In addition, Euronews in Turkish will be distributed all over Turkey by TRT to be available on all distribution networks: analogue and digital terrestrial network, cable, satellite, IPTV, mobile etc. TRT will make Euronews available to 100% of TV households which represents more than 17m Turkish homes.

© Rapid TV News 2009

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Digital TV Labs to test for CI Plus

By Julian Clover | March 5, 2009 | 10:48 UK

Bristol-based Digital TV Labs has been awarded the contract to be the world’s first approved test centre for the CI Plus (Common Interface) Specification.

CI Plus is the extension to the DVB Common Interface designed to facilitate secure pay-TV services over third party networks. The award was made by CI Plus LLP, the former CI Plus Forum, backed by Sony, SmarDTV, Samsung, Philips and Neotion.

“The benefits of CI Plus are many, both from receiver manufacturer – including Integrated Digital TVs [IDTVs] of course – and operator perspectives,” explained Keith Potter, CEO, Digital TV Labs. “The industry is beginning to see increased legislative pressure, particularly in the cable sector, for operators to open up their networks. For pay-TV service providers it will also allow reception on a greater number of devices and will enable better security support for HD content.”

Although there has been enthusiasm for CI Plus from operators including the Netherlands and Germany, the latter faces difficulties in fully implementing the concept should *** continue to disapprove of anything other than embedded conditional access.

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Conax in buoyant mood

By Chris Dziadul | March 5, 2009 | 11:19 UK

Conax secured 58 new customers in 2008, while its card deliveries were 40% up on the previous year.

All told, the content security company now delivers solutions to over 300 digital TV operators in 78 countries around the world.

Commenting on the results, Geir Bjørndal, the company’s EVP Sales & Marketing, said the company was well positioned to tap into a market that is likely to see the number of digital TV households double from today’s 350 million by 2013.

He added that Conax experienced 68% growth in India in just one year and is now the market leader in Latin America.

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Fashion TV extends coverage

By Chris Dziadul | March 5, 2009 | 11:06 UK

Fashion TV has finally made its debut in the Czech Republic and Slovakia, two months after its expected launch.

According to HN, the channel is on air for 24 hours daily and employing a single stream, reaching 680,000 homes in the Czech Republic and 350,000 in Slovakia.

As previously reported in Broadband TV News, the licence for Fashion TV in the two countries is held by a company named Carolinas Corporation.

The majority (70%) of the channel’s output is international, with the remainder produced in-house.