Focus: Broadcasting

[Via Satellite 11-21-13] Harmonic has appointed Frank Montalto as the company’s regional vice president for North American cable and telco, and Spencer Hodson as the company’s vice president of sales strategy, operations and enablement. Prior to Harmonic, Montalto served as director of sales operations at Cisco for the North American MSO segment, leading a sales...

[Via Satellite 11-19-13] SIS Live has selected Ateme’s Kyrion encoders and decoders to equip 18 new Ka-band vehicles with the latest compression technology for its clients, ITN and ITV. The Kyrion CM5000 uses a mode of satellite modulation known as “smaller guard intervals,” that will soon be standardized under DVB-S2x, maximizing the effective bandwidth of...

[Via Satellite 11-19-13] Eutelsat, in collaboration with Orange Group, is presenting a white paper published by Idate titled “Advanced TV Services for all, Available Now with Hybrid Broadcast Broadband TV Solutions.” Based on examples in key markets that include Korea (Olleh TV Skylife), the United States (DirecTV), France (a Fransat partnership with Samsung), Poland (Orange...

[Via Satellite 11-18-13] Cyfrowy Polsat signed a new contract for additional capacity at Eutelsat‘s Hot Bird video neighborhood and a multi-year agreement to extend the lease of existing capacity. “The new satellite resources at Eutelsat’s Hot Bird environment will enable us to further expand our channel offering,” said Dariusz Dzialkowski, CTO, Cyfrowy Polsat. A total...

Jawad Abbassi is the founder and general manager of Arab Advisors Group, a specialized research, analysis and consulting company focused on the communications, media, technology and financial markets

[Via Satellite 11-14-13] Worldwide pay-TV subscriber base surpassed 886.5 million people at the end of the third quarter of 2013 – a 6 percent year-on-year (YoY) increase – generating  $62.6 billion service revenue during this period according to ABI Research. “Emerging markets are key drivers of global growth in pay-TV subscribers as developed markets are...

[Via Satellite 11-13-13] Comcast Wholesale has renewed and expanded key agreements with SES for nearly 650 MHz of C-band capacity to deliver content management and delivery solutions to media companies across North America. As part of the multi-year deal, Comcast Wholesale continues to use 16 transponders aboard the AMC 18 satellite and one transponder on...

[Via Satellite 11-13-13] Rai and Eutelsat Communications have signed an agreement enabling Italy’s public service broadcaster to deliver its new portfolio of HD channels across the country. Rai will broadcast its three flagship channels in HD – Rai 1, Rai 2, and Rai 3 – via the TivùSat satellite platform, which transmits through Eutelsat’s Hot...

[Via Satellite 11-13-13] Media Networks has reached an agreement with TV4ISP to provide pay-TV solutions for Internet Service Providers (ISP) in Brazil through the integration of Media Networks’ DTH and Go Digital wholesale pay-TV services. “The Brazilian pay-TV market is very dynamic and, in the last months, new opportunities have opened for the entry of...

[Via Satellite 11-12-13] Germany, with its buoyant economy, is a potential hotspot for satellite, particularly in terms of broadcast. Despite the inroads Sky Deutschland has made in recent years, the broadcast market has historically been a tough one for satellite to have a sizeable impact in this country. A strong Free-To-Air (FTA) environment still exists,...