Category: Software

MUMBAI: Dish TV, Zee Group‘s demerged direct-to-home (DTH) business, will get a capital infusion of up to Rs 7.5 billion with the promoters intending to subscribe to preference shares.

“The board has approved, subject to appropriate approvals, issue of non-cumulative non-convertible redeemable preference shares of Rs 100 each up to Rs 7.5 billion on a private placement basis to promoter group,” Dish TV said in a statement.

The promoters had earlier offloaded nine per cent stake in the company to a few institutional investors to raise Rs 4.45 billion. The capital raised would be used to fund the expansion plans of Zee‘s demerged distribution companies, Dish TV and Wire & Wireless India Ltd (WWIL).

Dish TV plans to pump in Rs 10 billion over two and a half years in a bid to ramp up its subscriber base.

Meanwhile, the board has also approved a related proposal to increase the company‘s authorised share capital from Rs 730 million to Rs 8.25 billion.

The company will hold an Extra Ordinary General (EGM) of the shareholders on 25 May.

NEW DELHI: ‘Hindustan Times’, one of the first print newspapers to launch an online edition of hindustantimes.com, has refurbished its website in collaboration with Microsoft to make it more reader-friendly and attractive.

The new newspaper-on-the-web was launched today with a promise to have round-the-clock news updates apart from interactive and personalized features in keeping with the need of multitasking that the today’s viewer demands from an online portal.

Rashmi Berry who heads the portal – which was ranked the fourth best news site by Forbes in 2004 – said advantage had been taken of the features of Microsoft ASP.NET 2.0 combined with the out-of-the-box functionalities of the Microsoft Commerce Server 2007.

She claimed that months of usability research had gone into re-designing the website, which was not clutter-free with easy to navigate drop-down menus and tab-based controls. The 1024×768 resolution for full screen utilization would also ensure speed, she said.

Other facilities on the site include a search engine, download facilities, the absence of pop-ups, RSS feeds, personalized zones, instant polls, streaming video, a stocks tracker to match scorecards, uploading photographs, rating stories, and adding them to del.icio.us or IM links. There is a separate section for cricket fans.

Functionalities developed using the ASP.Net platform include Web 2.0 features like instant switching using tab based controls, dynamic modules on related stories, and My Zone, a personalized news zone where the user defines his or her order of preference. Further, Ajax Controls are used for bringing real-time updates of matches, stocks, opinion polls and picture slide shows.

MUMBAI: Azureus, which works in the area of aggregating and distributing video via an online peer-to-peer (P2P) application, today has announced a content agreement with Unicef.

This is Unicef‘s first P2P distribution initiative . Azureus will publish all of Unicef‘s short and long-form broadcast quality video for use by socially conscious consumers around the world via its new digital media platform, Vuze (www.vuze.com).

A broadband distribution platform that enables a global community to share and discover unique high quality content, Vuze claims to attract more than 2 million global visitors after only a few months in existence.

Unicef says that it has a unique opportunity with Azureus to take advantage of the global reach of Vuze to draw attention and support for children in developing countries through the power of high quality video. Unicef says that with Vuze, its videos will easily be available online to view and share for free and help raise social consciousness around the many powerful initiatives it is involved in.

Unicef videos will be published by Azureus on Vuze, including video news packages, public service announcements and vodcasts. An automated system will transfer Unicef‘s complete video library onto Vuze to be available to millions of people throughout the world. The site will feature touching videos from Unicef Goodwill Ambassadors like Sarah Jessica Parker, Shakira, Clay Aiken and Roger Federer.

Other soon-to-be available titles include: ‘One-stop‘ Clinic Helps New Mothers Keep Their Children Healthy in Gambia, Rural Centres Provide Early Childhood Development Services in Iran and Venezuelan Indigenous Group Begins to Revive its Lost Language.

Azureus states that Vuze‘s tools will allow humanitarian organisations to economically and effectively reach millions of citizens worldwide to help drive awareness and ultimately affect change.

Launched this month, Azureus‘ new platform, Vuze, serves as an alternative, low-cost distribution and marketing platform to distribute compelling, High Definition content to a fast growing global audience of millions of active users. Both large and small content owners can promote their works to their fan base through comprehensive discovery tools including search, browsing, channels and tagging, as well as gauge market interest in specific territories. The entire experience, from search and discovery to payment, download and play, is tightly integrated into the application. Publishers can also distribute their work directly from the application.

Further demonstrating the platform‘s success, Azureus recently announced partnerships with several high-profile content providers, including the BBC Worldwide (including BBC HD), Showtime Networks, A&E Networks (including A&E, The History Channel, and The Biography Channel), Nelvana Enterprises, Bennett Media Worldwide, G4 TV, National Geographic, Starz Media, more than 20 other media companies and thousands of self-publishers. Additional content from other partners will be made available on Vuze throughout the year.

MUMBAI: Internet major Yahoo! has acquireD Right Media which created the Right Media Exchange.

Yahoo! says that the acquisition will build upon its position in online advertising and is a key step towards executing the company‘s long-term strategy to transform how online advertisers connect to and engage with their customers – both on and off the Yahoo! network. Under the terms of the agreement, which follows Yahoo!‘s 20 per cent strategic investment in Right Media in October 2006,

Yahoo! will acquire the remaining equity interest in Right Media for approximately $680 million.

Yahoo! chairman and CEO Terry Semel says, “The acquisition of Right Media will further Yahoo!‘s goal to create the industry‘s most open, accessible and vibrant advertising marketplace, which will help democratize the buying and selling of digitally enabled advertising.

“This acquisition is an important step in our long-term vision to build the industry‘s leading advertising and publisher ecosystem. We believe that Yahoo!‘s open approach is a clear differentiator from others in the industry and provides significant benefits to advertisers, publishers and Yahoo! itself.”

The Right Media Exchange is an emerging online advertising exchange, and as publishers increasingly turn to exchanges to monetize their ad inventory, this acquisition will help Yahoo! establish a strong position in this large, attractive and fast growing segment of the online ad market.

Right Media CEO and founder Michael Walrath says, “We share Yahoo!‘s vision of a more empowered marketplace, where efficiency, transparency and accountability in online advertising become the norm. We are very excited by the prospect of becoming part of Yahoo!, the market leader in display advertising, as it looks to revolutionize the media buying and selling landscape.”

Right Media‘s open exchange will facilitate a frictionless model where buyers have equal opportunity to engage with the largest, most valuable audiences and to extract the maximum value from their campaigns and sellers can access an enormous pool of advertisers and foster competition for their inventory to maximise revenue. Yahoo! will increase its participation in the Right Media Exchange both as a buyer and seller to help increase liquidity in the exchange while empowering publishers and advertisers to generate more value for themselves within this vibrant marketplace.

Advertisers will have greater inventory and audience options from Yahoo! and other participants in this exchange, as well as increased control and visibility into the buying process.

Publishers will be able to bundle their own ad inventory with Yahoo!‘s inventory and the exchange‘s inventory – thereby boosting demand and generating the highest returns for each ad placement.

Ad networks will reap the same benefits as advertisers and publishers, and additionally, the exchange will benefit those ad networks with unique value propositions, giving them an opportunity to compete with the largest players, thanks to reduced friction and increased transparency.

For Yahoo!, this more open approach will allow the company to increase liquidity, allow advertisers to more efficiently ascertain the true value of display ad inventory, and generate greater returns for Yahoo!‘s own display inventory. It will give Yahoo! a new channel and inventory for excess demand and provide an opportunity to derive more value from non-premium inventory.

MUMBAI: Sun Microsystems in the US has introduced the Sun Streaming System — the industry‘s first massively scalable and cost-effective video delivery platform for cable and telecommunications operators.

This helps operators increase subscriber revenue by offering new video-based services and personalised, unique video streams to each consumer.

The system leverages the Solaris) 10 Operating System (OS) to deliver video streaming capacity by enabling cost-effective personalised video delivery over existing optical network infrastructure — consequently reshaping the economics and quality of video delivery
services.

Designed by Sun co-founder Andy Bechtolsheim, Sun‘s cutting-edge system design enables the Sun Streaming System to support up to 160,000 simultaneous, unique video streams at the rate of 2Mbps and a price of less than $50 per stream for complete video headend — which is approximately 10 times the streaming capacity of competitive platforms.

32 integrated 10 Gigabit Ethernet optical networking ports combine multiplexing, switching and routing all in one high-density video streaming package.

Bechtolsheim says, “Video on demand and IPTV are expected to become widely available by 2010. The Sun Streaming System‘s revolutionary design allows operators to capitalise on that market opportunity and deliver unique content and relevant advertising to each subscriber, increasing revenue for
operators and advertisers. As the first industry solution to offer 160,000 video streams per switch, it is also the industry‘s most scalable and cost-effective solution. We are extremely excited to see where the industry
will go with this new architecture.”

The Sun Streaming System is an integrated platform that is composed of a distributed software suite running on Sun Fire x64 systems, storage and switching technologies. Key components of the Sun Streaming System are the new Sun Streaming Software, the new Sun Fire X4950 Streaming Switch, the Sun Fire X4500 data server and the Sun Fire X4100 systems, which together provide the highest streaming throughput in the video services industry at the lowest cost.

— Sun Streaming Software: Based on open industry standards, the Sun Streaming Software is a single point of control to operate and manage the entire video streaming system. The software enables operators to reduce time to market for deploying new services by supporting more than 20 video streaming features, such as: MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 formats; bit-rate support from 1Mbps to 20 Mbps; standard-definition (SD) and high-definition (HD) streaming; encrypted and clear content streaming; at least six trick-play settings; Network Personal Video Recorder (nPVR) capabilities; and splicing and personalSzed playlists for permission-based target advertising. Open software standards, such as Corba, XML, HTTP and RTSP, allow operators to easily integrate third-party components for an end-to-end video headend solution.

— Sun Fire X4950 Streaming Switch: A scalable memory cache-based content switching and streaming engine, the Sun Fire X4950 Streaming Switch provides streaming density at 320 Gbps and up to 2 terabytes (TB) of memory to enable scalable video streaming with a low cost per stream.

MUMBAI: Major leaders of the telecommunications industry along with Bharti Airtel, India’s leading telecom services provider, have signed a formal construction and maintenance agreement in Kuala Lumpur last week, to build the first high bandwidth optical fiber submarine cable system from the South East Asia direct to the USA.

The cable system, known as the Asia-America Gateway (AAG), will be built at a cost of about $ 560 million.

The cable project is spearheaded by 17 telecommunications companies namely, AiTi, AT&T, BayanTel, Bharti, BT Global Network Services, CAT Telecom, ETPI, Maxis, PCP Company Limited, PLDT, Saigon Postal Corporation, StarHub, Telekom Malaysia, Telstra, TNZL, Viettel and VNPT.

The supply contract for the construction of the AAG cable system was signed between the AAG and the consortium of ASN-NEC Corporation, later on the same day, in Kuala Lumpur.

The AAG cable system is designed to provide 1.92 Tbps using Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing (DWDM) technology to provide upgradeable, future proof transmission facilities that support Internet and e-commerce, a company release asserts.

The birth of AAG cable system will compliment existing high bandwidth cable systems in the region. In addition, the AAG cable system will provide the much-needed diversity against traditional routes to the US, mainly carrying broadband traffic. This is important considering recent earthquakes that took out almost all cable systems in the region. The AAG cable system, with its large bandwidth and high quality transmission technology, will meet the present and future burgeoning growth in telecommunications traffic.

Says David Nishball, president, Enterprise Services, Airtel, “Our partnership in AAG cable system reinforces our commitment to invest in state of the art technologies for providing scalable and future proof solutions for our International customers. This investment is in line with our strategy to extend our International footprint and focus on connecting our customers in India to Asia and the Americas. While our existing i2i and SeMeWe4 cable systems already provide connectivity across the globe, the AAG cable system will help offer increased redundancy and resilient networks, while meeting the increasing demands of voice, private data and Internet traffic.”

New Delhi: The Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) today cleared the British telecom giant Vodafone‘s deal to buy mobile carrier Hutchison Essar subject to some conditions, after deferring a ruling thrice.

The file will now go to the Finance Ministry for a formal and final approval. FIPB has said the British company – the world‘s largest mobile operator in terms of revenues – has to comply with Press Note three of the Foreign Direct Investment rules, which were recently amended to permit FDI up to 74 per cent.

The FIPB which functions under the Finance Ministry has also said the 15 per cent stake held by Indians Analjit Singh and Ashim Ghosh and foreign investors cannot be
transferred.

Vodafone had bought a controlling 52 per cent stake in HEL from Hong Kong-based Hutchison Telecom International at a total enterprise value of over 18 billion dollars.

Expressing concern on the FDI inflow into India , FIPB said the Government should review the guidelines relating to foreign investment in the country across all sectors. ‘‘Under existing norms and guidelines, the FIPB has cleared the Vodafone deal, but the loopholes in the system need to be plugged,‘‘ an official told reporters after the meeting here.

In the last three meetings, the Board had sought more details about the deal, particularly the size of the foreign holding in the firm.

Satisfied that the shareholding of both Analjit Singh and Asim Ghosh was Indian, the FIPB said the approval of the Government would be needed to transfer the shares held by two Indian shareholders.

‘‘FIPB was satisfied that Vodafone only held 52 per cent under the Joint Venture,‘‘ said an FIPB official.

Under recently announced Press Note 3 ‘‘Indirect foreign investment shall mean foreign investment in the company/ companies holding shares of the licensee company and their holding company/companies or legal entity (such as mutual funds, trusts) on proportionate basis. In any case, the `Indian‘ shareholding will not be less than 26 per cent.‘‘

MUMBAI: The average US household owns 25 consumer electronics (CE) products and the average adult spends $1,200 annually on these products according to a study released by the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA).

The 9th Annual Household and Teen CE Ownership and Market Potential Study also reveals the most owned CE products and tracks the growth rates of popular product categories

The top five growth sectors were digital video recorders (DVRs), network routers or hubs, MP3 players, cable modems and digital cameras. DVR ownership and network/routers in U.S. households grew eight percentage points since 2006 to 25 and 30 per cent respectively. Thirty-two percent of households now own an MP3 player, up seven percentage points since last year. Cable modem ownership grew six percentage points and digital camera ownership rose to 62 per cent of all US households.

CEA senior research analyst Elena Caudle says, “It’s interesting to note here that two of the fastest movers and shakers in the CE industry are devices that enable home networking. The other three products enable consumers to create, shift or transport digital content. As consumers continue to embrace digital technology this new convergence will continue to change the way Americans live, work and play.”

Other categories with significant growth include HDTV with penetration reaching a quarter of US homes. More than three-quarters of U.S homes have at least one cell phone; CEA estimates 178.5 million wireless phones are in use. DVD players have reached 84 percent household penetration and have surpassed VCRs, partially because of the availability of portable DVD players.

In addition to identifying top growth categories, the study reveals the five most owned products beginning with the television (92 percent), DVD player or recorder, VCR (82 percent), cordless phone (82 percent) and the cellular phone (76 percent).

“Many of the top owned products have enjoyed mass market saturation for years and will likely see growth based on upgrade and replacement sales. Some of the more intriguing categories are those that still occupy niche markets, such as mobile CE devices like GPS systems and satellite radio, which have seen healthy growth in the past few years.” said Caudle.

The study also sets out the spending habits of consumers by age demographics. While adults spend $1,200 annually on CE products, teens spend $350 each year which is about half of their total annual discretionary income. Adults with children and teens spend up to $500 more on CE purchases than the national average.

“This is excellent news for the industry as children and teens who currently influence household CE purchase decisions grow up to become the next generation’s early adopters,” adds Caudle.

MUMBAI: Singapore based Global Mobile Technologies is filing patents for real-time delivery of rich, user-requested content with interactive advertising to mobile phones.

Push-It enables Internet advertising to be translated into a mobile-ready format with “click through” and “call through” capabilities. This new technology opens the door for all web providers, enabling them to deliver any text, image, music, or video content with embedded advertising to mobile phone users.

Now, consumers can receive and experience multimedia content with relevant advertising on any IP-enabled mobile phone. GMT’s Push-It is currently compatible with over 1,000 mobile devices on the market and is specifically optimized for each, potentially reaching over two billion users. Push-It is designed to automatically arrive on mobile phone screens with a ring alert like a voice call.

Global Mobile Technologies CEO Jeff Harrison says, “Push-It solves the problem of delivering rich, interactive advertising to any mobile device, while allowing content owners to maintain control over the look and feel of messaging. We are introducing another dimension and value to the previously limited reach of mobile phone marketing.”

This technology the firm says eliminates the need to use the mobile browser and delivers rich web content directly to the user screen. Push technology sends user-requested content and multimedia directly to the user. Push-It automatically brings the media to the phone screen, without the complications of mobile Web navigation, superseding the difficulties of uploading and capturing web content to mobile phones.

MUMBAI: US media conglomerate News Corp‘s social networking site MySpace has launched a test version of its new China service.

News Corp has inked a deal to license the brand for MySpace and allow local Chinese businessmen create local domestic business based on it.

Media reports indicate that News Corp is keen to avoid mistakes made by the first and second waves of international Internet companies that came to China. By putting a local manager in News Cporp is looking to give MySpace a chance in a very crowded area. There are at least 100 companies competing in the same space that MySpace has just entered.

Yahoo, eBay and other Internet firms have also have turned to local partners to run their China operations after struggling to win market share reports state.