Arqiva has been awarded a contract by the BBC to help bring Freesat, the free-to-air digital TV platform, to air by March 2008. Arqiva will provide the BBC with an end-to-end distribution solution for the platform management data, which will have fully-redundant back up across dual teleports. Arqiva will implement multiple circuits between two key […]

James Purnell, the UK's culture secretary, has announced a new convergence think-tank made up of experts from both inside and outside government. The first task of the think-tank will be to organise a series of public looking first at how to secure open markets and empower consumers. It will move on to look at the […]

The Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (Icasa) has confirmed the winning bidders of the new commercial satellite and cable subscription broadcasting licences. The only surprise was the withdrawal of Sentech from the race, as it was expected that pay-television giant MultiChoice would win and so would Telkom Media which is expected to be MultiChoice's […]

Michael Grade, executive chairman of ITV outlined a five-year, self-funding strategy to increase revenue, improve programming and expand its online audience. Grade's plan – envisaging a doubling of income from ITV Productions to £1.2 billion (E1.71bn) by 2012 and a quintupling of Internet revenue to £150 million within three years – hinged on self-sufficiency. “We […]

From the end of September, Virgin Media will offer its subscribers the opportunity to interact with BBC radio content through red button technology. Listeners will be able to access track information, news, music charts, and programme listings, along with sport and weather. Stations will also have links to the Corporation’s enhanced TV services.

UK commercial TV news provider ITN is to produce Setanta Sports News when it goes on air later this year. The channel, backed by Setanta Sports and Virgin Media, will be made available to the its three million digital TV subscribers. ITN was brought on board after sports production house TWI pulled out of the […]

From Branislav Pekic in Rome Portuguese pay-TV operator TV Cabo will launch 15 new channels by the end of the year, taking the total number to 103. Currently, TV Cabo offers its subscribers a total of 87 channels (65 basic, 9 Premium and 13 radio stations) and all of the new channels. Among the new […]

From David Del Valle in Madrid The Spanish TV networks are considering launching pay-TV services and content on the free-to-air digital terrestrial platform following the Italy’s example. They have been making a technical trial in Extremadura, west of Spain, aimed at knowing what type of content the consumer would be interested in and testing technology. […]

Entriq has confirmed that BSkyB will use its services to support the delivery of pay-per-view television content. The EST (electronic sell-through) service will enable Sky to offer pay-per-view content via its online portfolio. With the Entriq service, customers with a 2Mb or greater broadband connection will be able to download a selection of Sky content, […]

Sony Pictures Television International (SPTI) has signed a video on demand (VOD) agreement with ITI Neovision, part of the ITI Group, the Polish media and television entertainment company. The deal brings many of Sony Pictures recent movies to subscribers of ITI's digital satellite entertainment service, n. The service, to be branded nVOD, downloads the movies […]