ITV

Tag: Sunil Khanna

  • Dish TV CEO Sunil Khanna quits

    Dish TV CEO Sunil Khanna quits

    MUMBAI: ASC Enterprises has announced that Dish TV CEO Sunil Khanna has decided to move out of the company on completion of his two-year contract at the KU-band direct-to-home platform, promoted by Subhash Chandra.

    According to an official release issued, the Dish TV board had offered Khanna a renewed contract but he has decided to pursue other interests.

    Information available with Indiantelevision.com indicates that while Khanna will be “remaining in the broadcast sector, he will be taking up a new challenge”.

    Khanna has been with the Zee Group since its inception. He started his career with the group while driving the distribution venture Siticable. He subsequently spearheaded the pay TV business and lead Zee Turner. Before joining Dish TV as CEO, he also had a stint as president of Zee Telefilms.

    At Dish TV, his contribution has been in developing and building the first addressable digital platform. During the last 15 months, Dish TV accelerated the process of subscriber acquisition and now is established as the leading digital brand with 1.3 million subscribers.

    Dish TV, today offers 160 satellite channels along with other value added services and has string network of 8,000 distributors/dealers.

  • Dish media campaign draws flak from cable ops

    Dish media campaign draws flak from cable ops

    NEW DELHI: Dish TV’s media campaign revolving round freedom-from-cable-problems theme has incensed a section of cable community, which feels it’s “unethical.”

    In a letter e-mailed to Dish TV, All India Aavishkar Dish Antenna Sangh (AIADAS), one of the many bodies representing the cable fraternity, has exhorted the DTH company to withdraw the “misguiding advertisement.”

    “The whole cable TV community is shocked on seeing the business-damaging and misguiding advertisement campaign launched by Dish TV through various news papers, hoarding, and bus shelters. This type of advertisement campaign has hurt the cable TV fraternity in India as a whole,” the AIADAS letter states.

    The letter further highlights that the latest Dish campaign would severely hurt the business of cable operators; almost to the extent of crushing them out.

    “In case the (cable) consumer shifts (to DTH), who is going to pay compensation to the cable TV operator?” Dr. AK Rastogi, head of AIADAS, has asked in the letter.

    Though Rastogi claimed that Dish has agreed to withdraw the damaging ad campaign in deference to the cable industry’s anguish, Dish TV CEO Sunil Khanna denied any such move.

    “We are not withdrawing any campaign, nor altering it,” Khanna told Indiantelevision.com today afternoon.

    He added that instead of being cry babies, cable operators should seize this opportunity to digitize their networks and offer consumers better services than before.

    “With competition around in DTH sphere, there is bound to be consumer awareness campaigns highlighting the advantages of a DTH service. The cable operators should brace themselves for reality,” Khanna said.

  • Dish TV inks deal with BVITV for MoD service

    Dish TV inks deal with BVITV for MoD service

    MUMBAI: The direct-to-home Dish TV has added Walt Disney movies to its movie-on-demand (Mod) offering besides providing Bollywood movies.

    For this, DishTV has entered into an agreement with the international television distribution arm of The Walt Disney Company -Buena Vista International Television-Asia Pacific (BVITV-AP) to air the latest blockbuster movies on its value added service.

    Subscribers of the Mod pay-per-view service will have access to a slate of box office hit features from Walt Disney Pictures, Touchstone Pictures, Miramax and Jerry Bruckheimer Films including The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, Disney’s highest grossing film to date, Casanova, Cinderella Man, Herbie: Fully Loaded, Dark Water, and Flight Plan, informs an official release.

    Speaking about the tie-up, Dish TV CEO Sunil Khanna said, “Strategic alliances of this magnitude and nature are very important for any operator in any market. We are happy to tie up with BVITV at a juncture when the Mod services for Hindi movies has already been launched and now Dish TV is all set to launch the same service for English movies as well. With this move, we will be able to offer this service to more than 1.2 million subscribers of Dish TV spread across the country”.

    The movie can be ordered through SMS, phone or by logging on to www.dishtvindia.in. The consumer can watch the movie for 24 hours at his/her own convenience at a cost of Rs. 50 per movie.

  • SET-Discovery announces sign-on to Dish TV

    SET-Discovery announces sign-on to Dish TV

    MUMBAI: It’s now official. The Sony-Discovery One Alliance today announced a distribution tie-up with India’s first direct-to-home service Dish TV to carry their channels.

    The announcement confirms the exclusive report put out by Indiantelevision.com last week (7 June) that the two parties had arrived at a memorandum of understanding and the official signing would happen withinin the next few days.

    The official signing of the deal means that all the channels from ‘TheOneAlliance’ bouquet – SET, MAX, Discovery Channel, Ten Sports, SAB, Discovery Travel & Living, AXN, Animax, MTV, PIX, Animal Planet and Nick – will be available on the Dish TV DTH platform by today. Currently, Dish TV carries more than 120 channels and is available across the country.

    Commenting on the tie-up, SET India CEO SET-Discovery chairman Kunal Dasgupta said, “We expect significant growth in the subscriber base for Dish TV and for the DTH market in India due to this tie-up between SET Discovery and Dish TV.”

    “We welcome the SET Discovery channels on Dish TV. We have been growing at a healthy rate in the last year and the addition of ‘TheOneAlliance’ bouquet of channels will enable us to offer our customers a complete family package at affordable prices.” said Dish TV CEO Sunil Khanna.

    Elaborating on the SET Discovery – Dish TV tie-up, Deepak Shourie, EVP & MD, Discovery Networks India and Director, SET Discovery said, “We are extremely pleased with this arrangement as we believe that it would enhance a Dish TV consumer’s television viewing experience and take it to a new level.”

  • Dish TV MD Sunil Gupta on way out

    Dish TV MD Sunil Gupta on way out

    MUMBAI: Zee’s DTH service Dish TV, which will soon be demerged as part of a major overhaul to streamline Subhash Chandra’s broadcasting business, is also seeing changes in its top management.

    Sunil Gupta, who joined Dish last November as managing director from Coke India where he was VP external affairs, South Asia, is leaving what is currently India’s only private DTH operator.
    Chandra confirmed to Indiantelevision.com that Gupta, whose initial responsibilities when he came aboard included increasing Dish TV’s subscriber base and penetration of the service across the country, would soon be leaving the company.

    Gupta was working along with Dish TV CEO Sunil Khanna in leading New Era Entertainment Network Limited (NEENL), which manages the affairs of Dish TV. Zee Telefilms holds 20 per cent stake in the company.

    Gupta has earlier worked with The Times of India as well as had a stint at Jain TV as COO.
    Dish TV is close to 1 million subscribers and is signing up around 3,000 customers a day. The average revenue per user (ARPU) is reportedly running at Rs 200 per month with services subsidised through the provision of a free annual subscription after a one-time charge of Rs 4,000.