Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Thursday, Oct 02, 2003
Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Thursday, Oct 02, 2003 |
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Industry & Economy
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Radio/TV Zee to launch DTH without other major broadcasters on board Nithya Subramanian
New Delhi , Oct. 1 IT is known to be a revolution in television broadcasting and is expected to provide the viewer a choice of several hundred channels. But the Subhash Chandra promoted ASC Enterprises, which commences its direct-to-home (DTH) operations on October 2, 2003, will have to work hard to get other broadcasters on board. Presently the platform will offer just 48 channels — most of which belong to the Zee Turner bouquet — - while other big broadcasters such as Star, Sony or ESPN have not come aboard. A spokesperson for the company said, "We are planning a soft launch and we are basically looking at non-metros. We are targeting those areas where cable TV has not reached. While initially, we will offer 48 channels, we are also looking at adding other niche channels and movie channels to our bouquet." But industry sources said that without some of the popular channels, it would be difficult for the DTH service to take off. Officials in Star India said, "We have received a proposal from ASC for two of our channels. But we have not yet made up our minds." Other channels such as ESPN-Star Sports and Sony that have also not yet signed up have raised concerns over security and piracy. Meanwhile the ASC spokesman said that a few thousand households would receive channels through DTH from tomorrow. "A household would have to pay Rs 150 per month to receive these channels besides investing about Rs 4,000 for the receiver," he added. The service is being branded as Dish TV and an aggressive marketing and promotional campaign is being envisaged later. Competition among DTH players is expected to heat up. The Star Group is in talks with the Tata Group to foray into the segment. Doordarshan is also planning to use this platform to reach out to far-flung areas of the country.
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