DirecTV Latin America (DTVLA) president Bruce Churchill believes telcos will find it tough in terms of developing IPTV strategies in Latin America, but hopes it can work with telcos the way DirecTV has in the U.S. in terms of joint marketing and selling of services to customers.

Churchill said “the telcos will face real challenges in terms of quality of the plant and the level of investment that would be required to upgrade it so that it could carry IPTV. The more natural partnership between us and telcos is more along the lines what you see in the U.S. with DirecTV and Verizon, BellSouth and Qwest.”

Deals along those lines are already beginning to take place in the region, Churchill added. “We have some agreements already in place in Latin America, but it is very early days. We have agreements in Brazil with Brasil Telecom and Telemar. We have a couple of agreements in Chile, Colombia (Orbital and OTB), Telecom Argentina and Puerto Rico Telecom in Puerto Rico. All of them have been done this calendar year.”

An exclusive in-depth interview with Bruce Churchill can be found in the June 11 issue of Satellite News. For more information about subscribing to Access Intelligence’s satellite newsletters, check out our Web site at https://www.satellitetoday.com .