ITV

Category: DTH Operator

  • NCLT adjourns Dish TV India-Yes Bank matter till 22 December

    NCLT adjourns Dish TV India-Yes Bank matter till 22 December

    Mumbai: The Mumbai bench of the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) has scheduled the next hearing of the Dish TV-Yes Bank matter on 22 December. It has also allowed Yes Bank two weeks’ time to file its reply in its case against Dish TV India.

    The bench also said that Dish TV India could file a rejoinder, if any, within one week, according to a report by Moneycontrol.

    Yes Bank had sought NCLT’s direction to call for an extraordinary general meeting (EGM) of shareholders of Dish TV India to pass a resolution for the reconstitution of the company’s board.

    On 6 September, Yes Bank had sent a requisition notice to Dish TV India’s board to convene a special meeting of the shareholders seeking the removal of its board of directors including managing director Jawaher Lal Goel and independent directors Dr Rashmi Aggarwal, Bhagwan Das Narang, Shankar Agarwal, and Ashok Mathai Kurien.

    The bank proposed the appointment of a new board including Akash Suri, Sanjay Nambiar, Vijay Bhatt, Haripriya Padmanabhan, Girish Paranjape, Narayan Vasudeo Prabhutendulkar, and Arvind Nachaya Mapangada.

    Yes Bank holds a 25.63 per cent stake in the company. It stated that it sought the removal of the present board of directors on the grounds that the board approved a Rs 1000 crore rights issue process despite objections raised by the bank, solely to dilute the shareholding of the bank.

    Dish TV India board rejected the EGM notice by Yes Bank stating that a resolution to reconstitute the board can only be placed post receipt of approval from the ministry of information and broadcasting and other requisite approvals for appointment of new directors, within statutory guidelines.

  • Dish TV partners with Mogi IO for image optimisation solution

    Dish TV partners with Mogi IO for image optimisation solution

    Mumbai: DishTV has joined hands with Mogi IO to deliver to its customers highly optimised image quality that enables faster website download speeds. The cooperation between the two entertainment solution providers will help with superior user engagement and better economics of scale, said the statement.

    The partnership between DishTV and Mogi Solutions will optimise the images by 80 per cent implying an 80 per cent reduction in bandwidth usage and data transfer cost. This results in reducing the bounce rate and increasing the footfall of the website. Faster downloads will ensure customer satisfaction and improved monetisation.

    “It is a very prestigious tie-up for us when one of the leading media brands, DishTV joins hands for our solution. This proves the scalability of our solutions and demonstrates to the market our technology strength,” said Mogi IO co-founder and chief executive officer Vikrant Khanna.

    “Faster website download speeds would result in enhanced SEO ranking on Google algorithms. Organic ranking is good for organic footfalls, thus making a great economical breakthrough,” he added.

    The pandemic has bolstered content consumption. Millennial and Gen Z consumers are drivers of this consumption and prefer to consume online videos. Globally, the trend is similar with video consumption constituting 80 per cent of internet traffic. At the same time, the global content distribution network (CDN) infrastructure, on which content streaming happens, is falling short of the demand.

    Mogi’s has built a patented streaming engine that uses a multi-CDN technology to ensure a buffer-free experience that leads to faster content delivery. It also creates automatic redundancies in case of CDN failures so that the viewer experience remains seamless.

    “Following the pandemic, we witnessed an upsurge in visitors to our website. Dish TV is a mass brand and has customers spread across all town classes and uses various devices. Network speeds also vary across the country. Keeping this in mind, we decided to get Mogi IO’s help to make our website more accessible and optimized for this set of customers, by implementing their image optimisation services,” said Dish TV India head of marketing for DishTV and Watcho Sukhpreet Singh. “We are hopeful this will help us improve our customers’ digital experiences, which is something that DishTV as a brand is always striving for.”

  • Dish TV seeks further extension of time to convene AGM

    Dish TV seeks further extension of time to convene AGM

    Mumbai: Dish TV India has applied to the Registrar of Companies, Mumbai seeking a further extension of time to convene their 33rd annual general meeting (AGM) from 30 November to 31 December.

    This is the second time the company has deferred its AGM which was originally scheduled to be held on 28 September. The company sought the extension in view of the issues arising out of the pendency of an application filed by Yes Bank before the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT), Mumbai bench.

    Yes Bank had sought NCLT’s direction to the company to call for an extraordinary general meeting (EGM) to pass a resolution for the reconstitution of the company’s board.

    On 6 September, Yes Bank had sent a requisition notice to Dish TV India’s board to convene a special meeting of the shareholders seeking the removal of its board of directors including managing director Jawaher Lal Goel and independent directors Dr Rashmi Aggarwal, Bhagwan Das Narang, Shankar Agarwal, and Ashok Mathai Kurien.

    The bank proposed the appointment of a new board including Akash Suri, Sanjay Nambiar, Vijay Bhatt, Haripriya Padmanabhan, Girish Paranjape, Narayan Vasudeo Prabhutendulkar, and Arvind Nachaya Mapangada.

    Yes Bank holds a 25.63 per cent stake in the company. It stated that it sought the removal of the present board of directors on the grounds that the board approved a Rs 1000 crore rights issue process despite objections raised by the bank, solely to dilute the shareholding of the bank.

    Dish TV India board rejected the EGM notice by Yes Bank stating that a resolution to reconstitute the board can only be placed post receipt of approval from the ministry of information and broadcasting and other requisite approvals for appointment of new directors, within statutory guidelines.

  • Yes Bank moves NCLT against Dish TV

    Yes Bank moves NCLT against Dish TV

    Mumbai: The Mumbai bench of the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) has allowed Dish TV India till 15 November to file its response in a petition filed by its majority shareholder Yes Bank.

    Yes Bank sought NCLT’s direction to call for an extraordinary general meeting (EGM) of Dish TV India and pass a resolution for the reconstitution of the company’s board.

    On 6 September, Yes Bank had sent a requisition notice to Dish TV India’s board to convene a special meeting of the shareholders seeking the removal of its board of directors including managing director Jawaher Lal Goel and independent directors Dr Rashmi Aggarwal, Bhagwan Das Narang, Shankar Agarwal, and Ashok Mathai Kurien

    The bank proposed the appointment of a new board including Akash Suri, Sanjay Nambiar, Vijay Bhatt, Haripriya Padmanabhan, Girish Paranjape, Narayan Vasudeo Prabhutendulkar, and Arvind Nachaya Mapangada.

    Yes Bank holds a 25.63 per cent stake in the company. It stated that it sought the removal of the present board of directors on the grounds that the board approved a Rs 1000 crore rights issue process despite objections raised by the bank, solely to dilute the shareholding of the bank.

    Dish TV India board rejected the EGM notice by Yes Bank stating that a resolution to reconstitute the board can only be placed post receipt of approval from the ministry of information and broadcasting and other requisite approvals for appointment of new directors, within statutory guidelines.

    It also postponed its 33rd annual general meeting scheduled on 27 September by two months.

  • DTH subscribers grow in June quarter, Tata Sky maintains lead in pay TV genre: Trai

    DTH subscribers grow in June quarter, Tata Sky maintains lead in pay TV genre: Trai

    Mumbai: The number of pay DTH subscribers has increased from 68.57 million to 68.86 million during the April-June quarter in addition to subscribers of DD Free Dish, said Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) in its latest ‘Indian Telecom Services Performance Indicators’ report.

    Tata Sky continued to maintain the lead in the pay-TV genre with a share of 33.37 per cent, followed by Bharati Telemedia with 25.76 per cent, Dish TV India with 23.45 per cent and Sun Direct TV with 17.41 per cent. 

    According to the report, Reliance Jio Infocomm was the market leader in the access provider segment with 440.59 million subscribers and 36.64 per cent market share. It added 14.34 million telephone subscribers at the end of June.

    Bharti Airtel saw a marginal decline in subscribers from 357.17 million to 357.05 million. Vodafone Idea subscriber base also declined from 284.23 million to 273.88. Similarly, BSNL, MTNL, Tata Teleservices, Reliance Communication, and Quadrant lost subscribers in the quarter.

    The internet subscriber base in India grew from 825.30 million to 833.71 million at the end of June. This internet user base comprises 23.58 million wired subscribers and 810.13 million wireless subscribers. Out of the total internet base, 97.09 per cent are using mobile devices and 95.09 per cent are using broadband services to access the internet.

    BSNL is the leader in wired internet subscribers with a 25.57 per cent market share and 6.03 million subscribers followed by Bharti Airtel with 3.37 million subscribers. Reliance Jio holds a 59.901 per cent market share in the wireless internet subscriber base with 436.69 million subscribers followed by Bharti Airtel with a 26.76 per cent share.

    The top five service areas in terms of internet subscriptions (wired+wireless) are Maharashtra (71.21 million), Andhra Pradesh including Telangana (64.38 million), U.P.(East) (63.50 million), Bihar (56.81 million), and Tamil Nadu (56.41 million).

    The broadband internet subscriber base increased from 778.09 million to 792.78 million between March-June. Narrowband internet subscriber base decreased by 13.30 per cent from 47.21 million to 40.93 million.

    The top five broadband (wired+wireless) service providers in terms of subscribers are Reliance Jio (439.91 million), Bharti Airtel (197.10 million), Vodafone Idea Ltd (121.42 million), BSNL (22.69 million), and Atria Convergence (1.91 million).

    The top five narrowband (wired+wireless) service providers in terms of subscriber base are Bharti Airtel (23.05 million), Vodafone Idea Ltd (14.72 million), BSNL (3.01 million), MTNL (0.09 million), and You Broadband (0.01 million).

    In the wired narrowband segment, You Broadband India Pvt Ltd holds 26.23 per cent market share with 0.01 million subscribers followed by Foxtel Telecommunications Pvt. Ltd. with 0.007 million subscribers. In the wireless narrowband segment, Bharti Airtel holds a 56.40 per cent market share with 23.05 million subscribers followed by Vodafone Idea Ltd with 14.72 million subscribers.

    The total number of VSAT subscribers decreased from 293,632 to 289,392. Hughes Communication Limited continues to be the market leader with 44.83 per cent share in VSAT with a subscriber base of 129,724 followed by Tatanet Services with 74,704. Hughes Communication Ltd, added the maximum number of VSAT subscribers at 2344 whereas Bharti Airtel, BSNL, and Infotel Satcom saw a decline in their VSAT subscribers during the quarter.

    The number of private satellite TV channels increased from 901 to 915. The ministry of information and broadcasting has granted 16 channels permission for uplinking only, 70 for downlinking only and 829 for both uplinking and downlinking. There are 346 pay channels out of which 252 are standard definition and 94 are high-definition channels. The remaining 569 channels are free-to-air.

    There are 1731 MSOs registered with Trai out of which only 12 MSOs and one HITS operator have a subscriber base greater than 1 million.

  • Dish TV Board responds to Yes Bank’s notice, says EGM cannot be called

    Dish TV Board responds to Yes Bank’s notice, says EGM cannot be called

    New Delhi: In the latest turn of events, Dish TV has turned down Yes Bank’s call for an Extraordinary General Meeting (EGM), stating that the meeting cannot be called, as it will be in violation of the extant laws.

    The decision was taken in a Board meeting of the Company held on Wednesday, wherein the members reviewed the requisition notice sent by Yes Bank on 21 September. The Bank which holds a 25.63 per cent stake in Dish TV India Ltd had demanded an EGM to be convened, to oust the current directors and managing director Jawahar Lal Goel from the Company.

    On Wednesday, the Board said that it considered the factual background, as also the legal advice and the opinions received from various legal experts.

    According to the Board, Yes Bank Ltd is a Banking Company and YBL’s shareholding in the Company is a consequence of the invocation of pledges. “Therefore, there are certain embargos under the provisions of the Banking Regulation Act, 1949 read with Securities and Exchange Board of India (Substantial Acquisition of Shares and Takeovers) Regulations, 2011, because of which the said resolutions cannot be placed before the shareholders,” the Board stated.

    It further highlighted that resolutions proposed to be placed before the shareholders of the Company as sought by YBL require certain prior steps to be undertaken by YBL under the applicable provisions of SEBI (Substantial Acquisition of Shares and Takeovers) Regulations, 2011 and also prior approval to be obtained by YBL under the Competition Act, 2002; and, require prior approval of the ministry of information and broadcasting in respect of national security clearance as well as that of Company’s Lenders.

    “Accordingly, in view of the above and considering (a) its fiduciary duties and (b) that the Board shall be in violation of extant laws if it acts upon the Notice, the Board unanimously agreed that the EGM cannot be called,” it informed the stock exchange on Wednesday.

    Yes Bank had initially sent a notice to Dish TV on 6 September calling for a resolution for the removal of Rashmi Aggarwal, Shankar Aggarwal, Bhagwan Das Narang, and Ashok Mathai Kurien as directors, along with Jawahar Lal Goel as managing director of the company under Section 169 of the Companies Act, 2013. This would also remove Goel from the post of chairperson of the Company. It also sought the appointment of a new board of directors including Akash Suri, Sanjay Nambiar, Vijay Bhatt, Haripriya Padmanabhan, Girish Paranjape, Narayan Vasudeo Prabhutendulkar, and Arvind Nachaya Mapangada. 

    The proposal was to be tabled at the annual 33rd general meeting, which was to be held on 27 September. However, Dish TV deferred the meeting citing some regulatory approvals, following which Yes Bank sent a requisition notice calling for an EGM on 21 September.

    The Bank had alleged that the current Dish TV Board was “not acting in line with good corporate governance standards and is not a fair representation of the incumbent significant shareholders of the Company which holds about 45 per cent shareholding in the Company.”

  • Tata Sky launches Maharashtra focused campaign with Nana Patekar

    Tata Sky launches Maharashtra focused campaign with Nana Patekar

    Mumbai: DTH operator and pay-TV platform Tata Sky has rolled out a new Maharashtra-focused campaign featuring actor Nana Patekar.

    The ad film conceptualised by Ogilvy India has taken a spin on the colloquial Marathi phrases ‘Ugich Kashaala.’

    “With our new Maharashtra focused campaign, we not only highlight the distinct benefits of Tata Sky but also play on one of the most popular regional catchphrases i.e., Ugich Kashaala, to communicate that instead of needlessly postponing the decision, it is time for you to get a Tata Sky connection,” said Tata Sky chief communications officer Anurag Kumar.

    The brand highlights the convenience of watching live TV on the Tata Sky mobile app long with TV instead of fighting over the TV remote control.

    “This campaign is a great demonstration of how a culturally-rooted idea can be created to solve a business problem. We got Nana Patekar as the society’s favourite ‘Anna’ for admonishing people in his trademark style for asking Ugach Kashala Tata Sky?” said Ogilvy India chief creative officer Sukesh Nayak.

  • UCN Cable Network sets new Daughters’ Day world record

    UCN Cable Network sets new Daughters’ Day world record

    Mumbai: UCN Cable Network has set a new Daughters’ Day world record with a unique initiative encouraging people to feature their daughters’ names on house name plates. The extensive drive was recognised by the Golden Book of World Records on the occasion of International Daughters’ Day which is celebrated every year on 26 September.

    Naming the drive as the ‘largest campaign of displaying daughter’s name at house nameplate,’ The Golden Book of World Records awarded a provisional certificate to the Nagpur-based company.

    “UCN Cable has created history with this initiative that will go a long way in celebrating daughters and encouraging them to be achievers in life,” said Golden Book of World Records head Dr Manish Vishnoei, congratulating UCN Cable Network.

    The Golden Book of World Records recognises and honours national and global acts and events that are unique in terms of scale, precedence, or format. 

    The Daughters’ Day initiative undertaken by UCN Cable Network was found to be the first and fulfilling all parameters and requirements on assessment, following which its application for the world record was accepted, said the statement.

  • Dish TV India launches female-centric service ‘Women’s Active’

    Dish TV India launches female-centric service ‘Women’s Active’

    Mumbai: Expanding its portfolio of value-added services, Dish TV India Limited has launched a new ‘Women’s Active’ service in partnership with FTC Talent Media and Entertainment. 

    Aimed at today’s women who play multiple roles, ‘Women’s Active’ has specially curated programming centered on fashion, beauty, home décor, health, and wellness, said the statement.

    “In today’s fast-paced and demanding lifestyle, there is a growing need amongst our women audience, to find holistic and convenient solutions that help manage their day-to-day challenges,” said DishTV India Ltd executive director and group CEO Anil Dua.  “Keeping this in mind, we have launched the ‘Women’s Active’ service with carefully selected content. We are confident that the new service will be well received on both the DishTV and D2H platforms.”

    “The demographics have changed; with more and more women driving content consumer markets, influencing advertising and forcing content providers to think out of the box to keep them engaged,” said FTC Talent Media & Entertainment CEO Omar Qureshi. “With the marriage of FTC Talent Media & Entertainment along with the outreach of DishTV & D2H, the four ‘E’s of cutting edge, targeted content have been addressed – Entertainment, Education, Empowerment, Engagement. FTC has always focussed on edutainment as a powerful means of targeted content creation and it stays true to owner/ promoter Suniel Shetty’s vision of empowerment. Yes ‘Women’s Active’ will be just that – stories of and for women.”

    The ad-free service will be accessible on channel number 117 on both DishTV and D2H.

  • Yes Bank issues notice to Dish TV India calling for EGM

    Yes Bank issues notice to Dish TV India calling for EGM

    Mumbai: Yes Bank has called for an extraordinary general meeting (EGM) of shareholders of Dish TV India Ltd, after the latter sought an extension on its annual general meeting (AGM) scheduled for 27 September.

    The bank had issued a notice on 6 September calling for a resolution for the removal of the current board of directors of the company and appointment of a new board of directors including Akash Suri, Sanjay Nambiar, Vijay Bhatt, Haripriya Padmanabhan, Girish Paranjape, Narayan Vasudeo Prabhutendulkar, and Arvind Nachaya Mapangada.

    It had called for the ouster of Dish TV India’s managing director Jawaher Goel, and directors Ashok Mathai Kurien, Bhagwan Das Narang, Shankar Aggarwal, and Dr Rashmi Aggarwal.

    Yes Bank alleged that Dish TV India is seeking an extension of the AGM based on “unfounded reasons.” “In light of the company engaging in dilatory tactics in placing the resolution before the shareholders, the bank is constrained to issue the present notice for holding an extraordinary general meeting of the company,” it said.

    Dish TV India had notified the bank that a change in directorship requires prior approval of the ministry of information and broadcasting (MIB) and hence the resolutions for removal and appointment of directors cannot be placed before the shareholders at the AGM.

    To which the bank issued revised notices to the company on 9 September wherein the effectiveness in change in the directorship of the company was subject to MIB approval. The bank submitted details of the proposed list of directors to apply to MIB and seek their approval on 18 September.

    The bank believes that Dish TV India is not acting in line with good corporate governance standards and is not fairly representing the interests of the incumbent significant shareholders of the company. Its grievances include the company’s decision to move ahead with its capital raising exercise to the tune of Rs 1,000 crore by way of rights issue without consulting the significant shareholders.