Eastern Europe is seen as having rich potential for pay-TV offerings and while markets such as Poland and Russia often grab the headlines, there are some other less high profile markets which could offer new opportunities for the satellite industry. One such market is Georgia, a country with a population of 10 million people and a new battleground for DTH.
   MagtiCom is aiming to make its presence felt with a new DTH offer in the market. MagtiCom is Georgia’s largest telco and the owner of a DTH platform that already has around 2 million mobile subscribers. MagtiCom currently offers around five HD channels to its DTH subscribers, with the most popular being the NBA channel, as basketball is a huge draw in Georgia. MagtiSat also offers other HD channels such as Eurosport, National Geographic and Discovery in HD.
   MagtiCom CEO David Lee told IBC E-Daily that these factors create a good market for DTH. 
   “There are about a million households in Georgia and we would hope to go to at least 10 percent of those in the first few years,” Lee said. “We are already a large telephone company here, so we are looking at not much more than 50,000 subscribers to be profitable. The cheapest tariff we offer is around $7, but it can go up to $30 if you include all the HD channels.” 
   Georgia has an interesting history with its recent 2004 revolution bringing about change and more opportunities for commercial enterprises. It is an intriguing market for satellite and very successful in terms of imports and exports, according to Lee. “Georgia is making good progress in its integration into Europe. A lot of people think of this part of the Caucuses as being fairly Eastern, but in fact it is completely European,” said Lee. “They have their sights set on the West. The developing middle classes are already here, and there is a demand for technology and pay-TV services. For example, we have just bought out the Samsung Galaxy S3 phone. Smartphones and tablets are popular. Like a lot of countries that came out of the Soviet Union, they had a great craving for technology.”
   The company launched DTH services earlier this year with its services available thanks to a capacity deal with SES. It currently leases two transponders from SES. Lee expects the demands for capacity to increase. “We will need at least one more transponder, so we will definitely get a third transponder,” said Lee. “I think if we have three transponders, I think it will be enough. From what I see, 70 channels seem to cover most of peoples’ aspirations. We are not getting a lot of requests for things that are not already up. We are getting more requests for sports channels. It is a different market also in terms of the language. It is not quite as simple as if we were a European market.”
   MagtiCom is now working hard to become more of a force in the video market. It plans to go beyond DTH and would like to explore IPTV. “We have something in the business plan for TV over IP. This is something we will look to definitely do in the future. We see this as a way of learning about content, and learning about licensing issues. We see the future as a mix of IP, broadband IP, broadcast IP and satellite broadcasting. But, at the moment, the differentiator is the content,” said Lee.
   Satellite broadcasting could become a core business for the company in the future, as it has already established a strong base for the platform. 
   “[Satellite] is very much as an add-on to what we do. It could become a core business in the future. But, right now, it is in the adding value phase. This is still very much an exploratory period. People have not had these services before,” said Lee. “One of the interesting developments in the market is that there is an election coming up, and we are going to have to carry all of the local news channels. We are now potentially going to do a deal for another transponder, and if we do a deal for another transponder, we can add 10 more HD channels, but likely another three to four HD channels.”