Category: Software

MUMBAI: Canada‘s pay-TV market is expected to reach the saturation point this year, compelling the country‘s cable, satellite and IPTV operators to seek new growth opportunities, according to an IHS Screen Digest Television Intelligence Monitor Market Report from information and analytics provider IHS.

After years of steady expansion, penetration of pay-TV subscriptions among Canadian television households is set to reach an all-time high of 92 per cent in 2012, as presented in the figure below. Subscription be marginalised due to some customers buying HSD from cable operators.

Shaw is continuing to bolster its satellite fleet with an upcoming satellite launch to add HD channel capacity.

Declines at Bell Satellite TV are to be expected, as the company transitions existing customers to its Fiber TV service. For Shaw Direct, however, its first recent quarterly decline comes as a surprise, especially since the company has not posted any declines since two consecutive quarters of decreases in the third and fourth quarters of 2004.

Overall, mixed quarterly results are to be expected, with satellite as a category expected to grow subscribers slowly through 2016.

IPTV plays to its strengths: IPTV players are in the best position in Canada‘s pay-TV market with several weapons in their arsenal, including capabilities to offer aggressive promotions, roll out fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) connections and expand the penetration of homes passed.

OTT not to kill cable ops: Despite the challenge posed by Netflix, IHS believes that Canadian pay-TV operators are better-positioned to fend off the threat from such OTT services. The majority of cable operators provide severe data caps that are easily reached with significant OTT video consumption.

By 2016, IHS expects Canadian pay-TV subscriptions to decline only slightly to 89.9 per cent of TV households.

MUMBAI: SingTel has unveiled a new and enhanced mio TV after a major acquisition deal with Fox International Channels (Fic) to offer 40 of its channels, most of which will be available from 1 October.

Fic is an international broadcasters of branded subscription
television channels. The suite of channels making their debut on mio TV cuts across a range of genres and includes channels such as National Geographic Channel, Star World HD, Fox Movies Premium HD, and Star Chinese Movies.

SingTel MD of television Goh Seow Eng said, “We are thrilled with this ground-breaking deal as the addition of these FIC channels really takes the entire mio TV experience to a whole new exciting level. Customers love our world-class sports and latest on-demand content, ordered from the comfort of their sofas, but they also want the relaxing option of channel surfing and discovering new shows.”

The deal brings the total number of channels on mio TV to 111. The new channels span an assortment of languages and genres from the latest lifestyle, music and entertainment content to popular documentaries, children‘s programming and news. In addition to sought-after English and Chinese programmes, mio TV customers can look forward to compelling content on tvN, the leading Asian channel for Korean drama, K-Pop culture, variety shows, and lifestyle programming; Bollywood blockbusters on Star Gold; the best of Tamil entertainment programming on Vijay and the latest news and views on Fox News Channel and Sky News HD.

To ensure that customers have the fullest enjoyment of entertainment, mio TV will be restructuring its channel numbering system with the launch of the new Fic channels.

Goh said, “We will ensure little or no disruption to customers.

Existing channels will be available at their new and old channel numbers until end October to give customers time to adjust. All channels have also been organised by genre so viewers can conveniently use their remote control to scan easily for the most immersive experience”. Another enhancement that will please fans of Korean drama series is the fact that KBS World is now available in HD, and ONE HD will be available with both English and Chinese subtitles from 17 September.

Based on feedback from customers, the mio TV channels have been repackaged to ensure that customers are getting the best possible value with a mix of great content and significant savings.

Goh said, “There is no change in pricing for existing customers unless they choose to upgrade their entertainment options with the new channels. When they explore our new packages, we are confident that they will be delighted by how well these value-for money packages serve the entire household.”

New Delhi: A parliamentary committee has expressed surprise at the Information and Broadcasting (I&B) Ministry‘s failure to check the sources that carry non-permitted television channels other than the cable operators.

The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Information Technology has said it cannot understand the reason behind the I&B Ministry‘s assertion that the cable operators were to be blamed for the carriage of illegal television channels.

The Parliamentary committee has said that a document prepared by the I&B Ministry had stated, while explaining how illegal channels reach subscribers‘ homes through cable networks, that the source can be broadband, internet, IPTV, mobile TV, video streaming, etc.

During its examination of the Cable Television Networks (Regulation) (Second Amendment) Bill aimed at curbing telecast of illegal channels, the committee noted that even the Prime Minister‘s Office had asked the ministry to check carriage of non-permitted channels on the internet.

In the views furnished by the PMO to the ministry at the consultation stage, it was specifically mentioned that the problem of availability of non-permitted TV channels for viewing over the internet needs to be taken cognisance of and that the Ministry can take further action.

The committee, therefore, expressed surprise that the ministry has tried to ignore the important concern expressed by the PMO.

Instead of examining the issue, the Ministry has stated that the internet is, by and large, unregulated, except for certain restrictions under the Information Technology Act. The committee failed to understand how the issue of transmitting illegal/unregistered channels can be addressed in entirety without regulating a key source – the internet.

The committee during the course of deliberations tried to analyse the specific reasons for bringing the proposed amendments in the Cable Act that would be applicable to only cable operators in the context of showing illegal/unregistered channels.

The ministry justified the proposed amendments on the pretext that the DTH and IPTV services providers do not indulge in carriage of illegal channel as the channels carried on DTH service and IPTV service can be centrally monitored as these are addressable and leave a digital trail.

The other basis for the assertion of the ministry that DTH and IPTV service providers do not indulge in carriage of illegal channels is stringent licensing conditions for DTH and IPTV.

When the issue of licensing of cable operators to bring all the service providers on the level playing field was raised, the main constraint as expressed by the ministry in licensing cable operators was the infrastructure needed to provide licence to 60,000 cable operators.

The committee felt that the ministry needs to keep a constant watch on the new and emerging technologies and the international legislative framework in this regard to address the multiple challenges coming in the way.

Moreover, to provide the level playing field to various service providers, the extant legislation guidelines need a constant review in the light of the technological changes so as to avoid legal complications in managing the issue of illegal transmission.

The committee‘s attention was drawn during the course of examination to inequitable treatment to various service providers, viz. cable operators, DTH, IPTV, internet in the context of the amending provisions made in the proposed legislation. The cable associations were of the view that unregistered channels are carried through platforms other than cable like DTH, IPTV, mobile TV, video streaming, internet whereas the legislation has been brought only for the cable operators.

The committee during the course of deliberations with the cable industry stakeholders were given the impression that the cable operators are being over burdened with penalty, punishment and with so many regulations that small cable operators are unable to protect themselves.

The broadcaster associations on the other hand had given the impression to the committee that in their case stringent license conditions are applicable whereas in the case of a cable operator the requirement is only of registration.

The committee noted that the extant legislative framework/guidelines with regard to regulating unregistered/illegal channels has the commonality through the Cable Act and rules there-under, which prescribe the Programme Code and Advertisement Code. The common legislative framework is applicable to all the platforms as acknowledged by the ministry.

According to the FICCI- KPMG Indian Media Entertainment Industry Report 2012, the percentage of cable‘s share in last mile connectivity, which is 62 per cent at present, may come down to 47.3 per cent by the year 2015. During this period the DTH percentage may increase from 31 per cent to 46.7 per cent.

The committee observed that considering the emerging technologies, the scenario of TV watching may change drastically. With a multiple transformation taking place all over the world in the technologies available in the media and entertainment sector, the whole scenario of watching TV may change in future.

NEW DELHI: Ruling out any further shift in digitisation deadline, the Government has told local cable operators (LCOs) that there will be no relaxation in the sunset date for shutting off analogue and switching on to digital access systems by 1 November 2012 in the four metros.

Information and Broadcasting Ministry Joint Secretary (Broadcasting) Supriya Sahu also told the LCOs that all issues that they still had should be sorted out with the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai).

Sahu said that arrangements had been made for seeding a sufficient number of digital set top boxes in the metros, and said there was no reason for LCOs to protest the digitisation mandate.

She also said that problems related to registration in local post offices could be sorted out locally and need not be brought to the Ministry. The LCOs were complaining that registration was being given for only up to one year and there was no guarantee that it would be extended.

Later in a meeting with Trai chairman Dr Khuller, the LCOs were told there could be no change of Rs 45 in the share of the LCOs in the subscriber fee as this had been cleared by Parliament.

The cable operators who had come from different parts of the country and were led by A S Kohli of Delhi sought to plead with Trai that the rate could be not be lower than the one they were already getting, and also reiterated that the entire work of maintenance and bill collection was being done by them and not the multi-system operators.

MUMBAI: Siti Cable Network Ltd, formerly Wire and Wireless (India) Ltd, is raising Rs 3.24 billion from promoter firms to cut its debt and fund digitisation.

The company has received shareholders‘ approval for issue of warrants convertible into equity shares to overseas promoter group companies Essel International Ltd and Essel Media Ventures Ltd.

The Subhash Chandra-promoted multi-system operator (MSO) has a debt of Rs 4.5 billion.

The funds will also be for acquisition of MSOs, local cable operators (LCOs) and to meet the working capital requirements.

Essel International and Essel Media will invest the amount in tranches with the first tranche being 25 per cent of the issue price on allotment of warrants on a preferential basis. The balance amount will have to be paid by the two promoter companies within 18 months from the allotment of the warrants.

Siti Cable will issue 16,20,00,000 warrants convertible into equivalent number of equity shares at a price of Rs 20 per warrant. The shares of the company closed at Rs 20.55 per share, down 2.38 per cent, at close on Friday on the Bombay Stock Exchange.

The combined shareholding of Essel International and Essel Media will rise to 29.99 per cent after the two companies pay the full price of the warrants and convert them into shares, from the current 4.90 per cent. Simultaneously, the shareholding of other promoters (which includes Bioscope Cinemas Pvt Ltd with 57.95 per cent stake) will after the conversion of the warrants, fall to 43.09 per cent from 58.53 per cent. Essel Media currently has 3.63 per cent stake and Essel International 1.27 per cent.

The total promoter shareholding after conversion of all the warrants will rise to 73.08 per cent from 63.43 per cent now and that of the public will drop to 26.92 per cent from 36.57 per cent.

The price of the warrants is at a premium of 10 per cent over the price arrived at on the basis of SEBI regulations.

The company has filed for approval of the warrant issue with the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) as the two promoter group companies are registered overseas.

The name of the company was changed to Siti Cable Network Ltd following a fresh certificate of registration based on a special resolution passed by the shareholders on 30 August 2012.

MUMBAI: Pace, a leading technology developer for pay TV and broadband service provider, has said that its pre-integrated software, conditional access and set-top box (STB) solution has been selected by three Indian cable operators, Delhi Distribution Company (DDC), Faction Digital, New Delhi and Kozhikode Cablecommunicators Ltd.(KCL), Calicut, to support their move to digital cable.

Pace has designed its pre-integrated solution to provide a cost-effective alternative to operators who need a high quality pay-TV platform but don‘t have the time or infrastructure to manage multiple technology partners or complex systems integration work.

Pace‘s pre-integrated solution incorporates Pace‘s Tungsten device software and Titanium Conditional Access System (CAS) as standard on a Standard Definition (SD) or High Definition (HD) set-top box.

The Indian version of the solution includes a Pace India-developed user interface (UI) created specifically for local consumer browsing preferences in terms of colour and design, including a button on the box itself so that users can operate all functions if their remote control is missing or out of action.

DDC, Faction and KCL have selected the Pace solution to enable swift rollout of digital services to their customers as part of this process, which will see 80 million Indian households transitioned to digital services by the deadline. The solution‘s design allows the operators to quickly deploy digital services to customers via an SD set-top box, and then add PVR capabilities or additional services in the field over time, if and when their requirements change.

Pace International president Shane McCarthy said, “Pace aims to offer operators as many options as possible. The cost and time pressures for Indian operators are huge, and working with multiple partners to develop, integrate and deliver their service platform is not a realistic option.

“We have developed our pre-integrated solution to make operators‘ lives easier by giving them the option of a single source for their software, hardware and CAS. It provides DDC, Faction and KCL with a straightforward and cost-effective way of moving their subscribers to digital, while maintaining the high quality that customers have come to expect from Pace. This not only delivers up-front but also keeps customers‘ longer-term costs down.”

MUMBAI: KIT digital, a leading video management software and services company, has introduced the latest version of its video-on-demand (VOD) store solution which will allow content owners and service providers to establish a fully managed and monetised VOD capability.

The new release provides a number of enhancements including a new editorial and media workflow interface, which allows multiple endpoints to be served by a single editorial process.

“The VOD store sits on top of our flexible Cosmos video management platform to create a seamless ingest, publishing and delivery system. Combined with the skill and expertise of our systems integration and managed services teams, we can help our customers get innovative products to market rapidly,” said KIT Digital Chief Technology Officer Mark Christie.

The core of KIT digital‘s VOD Store solution is the Cosmos video management platform, a scalable, broadcast-grade video content management system for multi-screen delivery solutions. With the VOD Store solution, companies can centrally manage video assets for delivery to PC, connected TVs, set-top boxes, game consoles, tablets and smartphones.

Cosmos supports a range of revenue generation models including advertising, pay-per-view and subscription, all underpinned by flexible packaging and pricing tools that give content owners full control of merchandising. The VOD Store solution can be integrated with a wide variety of leading digital rights management (DRM) providers through Cosmos Guard, the platform‘s DRM abstraction layer. Cosmos Guard gives access to a comprehensive set of content protection options across a wide range of devices.

Alongside Cosmos‘ improved editorial user interface, the new VOD Store solution also includes support for multi-channel authoring and publishing, allowing editorial and business users to target content to different devices and geographies. It also includes full multi-lingual support including RTL languages and in-context editing allowing editorial staff to quickly modify promotions and other aspects of the user experience.

NEW DELHI: The process for the 2G e-auctions as directed by the Supreme Court will commence on 28 September with the issue of notice inviting applications.

The e-auction for the 1800 MHz band will begin on 12 November and that for the 800 MHz will be held two days after the close of the first auction. The payment of the successful bid amount will have to be made within ten calendar days of the close of the respective e-auctions.

In its judgment of 2 February this year, the Supreme Court had declared illegal and quashed the licences granted to the private respondents on or after 10 January 2008 pursuant to two press releases issued on 10 January 2008 and subsequent allocation of spectrum to the licensees. The direction became operative after four months.

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) was asked to make fresh recommendations for grant of licence and allocation of Spectrum in 2G band in 22 service areas by auction, as was done for allocation of spectrum in 3G band.
The Central Government was asked to consider the recommendations of Trai and take appropriate decision within next one month and grant fresh licences by auction.

The Information Memorandum for Auction in 1800MHz and 800MHz bands has already been issued giving timelines for the conduct of the auction.

Official sources said the Government has through Request for Proposal (RFP) process engaged . Times Internet Limited (lead partner) and e-Procurement Technologies Ltd. as consortium partner for design and conduct of the auction.

The timelines for auctions is given below :

NEW DELHI: The Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal (Tdsat) is to hear early next week petitions by multi-system operators Digicable Networks (India), Delhi Distribution Company, United Cable Operator’s Welfare Association and others challenging the digital tariff order of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai).

Although Tdsat had issued notice to Trai and the Union of India in this connection on 2 July, it was informed today that the regulator had filed its reply in early August and the Chaiperson Justice S B Sinha and member P K Rastogi had listed the matter for 24 August, but it could not be taken up for pressure of work. However, Tdsat decided to hear the matter next week when it was mentioned by counsel that it could not be delayed because of the sunset date for digitisation.

It will also hear a petition by IndusInd Media and Communications Ltd (IMCL) in this regard, and has permitted news broadcasters NDTV, Time Global (holding company of Times Now), India TV, TV Today, Total TV, and News Broadcaster‘s Association (NBA), Indian Broadcasting Foundation (IBF), and other broadcasters to be a party to it.
Digicable has approached the broadcast tribunal opposing the sector regulator’s new revenue sharing mechanism. In its petition, Digicable said Trai’s tariff order is “unjust, unfair, unreasonable, arbitrary, irrational, and discriminatory” and is tilted towards the broadcasters.

According to the Trai tariff order, charges collected from the subscription of paid channels or bouquet of paid channels shall be shared in the ratio of 65:35 between MSO and the local cable operator (LCO) respectively.

Earlier, local cable operators had opposed the Trai tariff order. United Cable Operator’s Welfare Association, New Delhi, has approached the Tdsat seeking better revenue share from the MSOs and an extension in date for digitisation.

Meanwhile, the deadline for the first phase of digitisation in the four metros has already been postponed by four months to 1 November.

MUMBAI: Digital marketing agency Digitas India has introduced its integrated e-commerce offering in India.

It has launched an end-to-end e-commerce solution for brands seeking to launch and maintain a professional and effective retail presence on the internet. This e-commerce solution has a “vast selection” of technology capabilities. It can be used to build every store conceivable, from a small boutique to an entire online mall.

Digitas‘ new offering claims to not only build the online store but also help users achieve desired RoI by ensuring traffic and motivation to buy by “romancing” the customer throughout the consumer‘s online journey. This includes visual presentation, reviews, ratings, social connects and demonstrations.

Digitas India president Kanika Mathur said “We romance the customer using insights, visual presentation and technology to give them a unique experience leading to enhanced RoI and business results”.

The features of the new service also include real time inventory updates from multiple warehouses, contact center system, multi dimension coupon system, multi mode payment gateway with cash on delivery / EMI Options, a 360 degree e-commerce eco-system, chat and banner management and a recommendation engine.

Digitas uses insights based on data, to plan an optimal media mix. This helps their clients in defining their target group. It uses SEO, SEM, Display and Mobile combined with a layer of remarketing for precision targeting.

Digitas APAC president Vincent Digonnet said, “Digitas‘ experience in e-Commerce includes building and managing several commerce strategies for clients across APAC including China and India. Our e-commerce experience allows us to quickly, get your e-store ready-sometimes in as less as 4-6 weeks. But ours is not just a technology offering or a DIY template which many tech companies offer. We truly believe that to make any brands e-commerce strategy successful, you need to ensure that people visit and buy from your e-store. The difference that Digitas commerce brings to the table is that we put a marketing lens on our technology engine and move from just ‘product listing‘ to ‘romancing the product‘!”

“Our engine can be customized and personalised completely, helping brands take the leap from soft marketing to driving sales” he further added.

According to Forrester, the Indian e-Commerce market in India will reach $1.6 billion in 2012 and is expected to grow fivefold, reaching $ 8.8 billion by 2016.