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Digital TV Europe July/August 2010
News digest
> 4 Meek named as Canvas chairman > 6 Mediaset to appeal EC’s Italian DTT ruling > 8 Virgin Media deal and Ofcom ruling lead to launch of multiple sports offers
Meek named as Canvas chairman as project gets green light By Stuart Thomson >
Kip Meek has been confirmed as the chairman of Project Canvas, the proposed joint ven- ture between the BBC, ITV, BT, Channel 4, Talk Talk and Arqiva to build an open internet-con- nected TV environment to com- plement the Freeview digital- terrestrial service.
In a joint statement, the part- ners said Meek would lead the board of the new venture and oversee the appointment of a CEO, who will have day-to-day operational responsibility. He will step down from his full- time role at Ingenious Media and his non-executive positions at the Broadband Stakeholder Group and Phorm. Prior to joining Ingenious, he held a variety of responsibilities at reg- ulator Ofcom, including chair- ing the European Regulators Group, and was instrumental in the establishment of BT’s oper- ationally independent infra- structure company Openreach.
Bulgaria
DSL > Elion ups IPTV subs The launch of a new Bulgarian DTH platform by telco Vivacom could benefit the market by edu- cating consumers about the merits of paying a regular con- tract fee for services, and will have a relatively minor competi- tive impact on cable operator Blizoo, according to Blizoo CEO
Meek: unlimit- ed choice and real control.
nected TV service will launch sometime in the first half of next year, following approval of the project by the BBC Trust. Speaking at the Intel Shaping
“Internet technology creates unlimited choice and can also give people real control over what they watch, and when they watch it,” said Meek. “Project Canvas will integrate the broad- cast and on-demand worlds to make this possible via the TV. It will also allow third-party busi- ness models to thrive through an open platform, bringing the benefits of next-generation TV to anyone who wants it.” Meek assumes the role with immediate effect and succeeds BBC director of future media and technology Erik Huggers who has acted as project chair for the last year. Project Canvas chief technol-
ogy officer Anthony Rose earli- er confirmed that the UK con-
Dimitar Radev. Radev, speaking at Informa’s Digital TV Central and Eastern Europe conference in Bucharest in June, said that a bigger threat to cable’s business model was a large number of semi-legal or illegal local opera- tors delivering large packages of TV services bundled in for a basic fee, who also promised subscribers very high headline broadband speeds that often were not matched by reality.
the Future of TV conference in London, Rose said that Canvas will not be made available to smart-phones or other devices, but will be focused on the TV, at least initially, primarily because of rights issues.
Despite earlier expectations
that Canvas could launch this year, the complexity of securing approval and coordinating the various parties involved have meant that a 2011 launch is now a certainty. The BBC’s govern- ing body approved the project on condition that the Canvas core specifications be published within 20 working days of approval being granted and that the final core specification is published no later than eight months before the launch of the first set-top boxes. Other conditions include the ability of users to access Canvas services
The Vivacom DTH launch would compete with the Total TV Bulgaria DTH services as well as with Blizoo (the company creat- ed by the merger of cable oper- ators CableTel and Eurocom). The former ITV Partner service was renamed as Total TV in May, following its acquisition in September last year by Mid Europa Partners, which also owns the Serbian platform of the same name.
free-to-air, although they may be charged for additional pay services that third parties might choose to provide via the plat- form; that the service should include accessibility features such as audio description; that access to the platform to con- tent providers and ISPs will not be bundled with other products and services and that access to the EPG will be fair; that Canvas will comply with com- petition and state aid rules, and that the BBC’s involvement will not exceed the BBC Executive’s estimated costs by more than 20% over a five-year period. Separately, UK newspaper and magazine publisher Richard Desmond is reported to be likely to take free-to-air commercial broadcaster Five back into the Project Canvas consortium following his Northern & Shell Group’s acquisition of the channel from RTL for £103.5m (€123m). RTL left Canvas some weeks ago, cit- ing cost as the reason (see p.33).
Denmark
CAB > Stofa sold to Ratos TeliaSonera is to sell its Danish subsidiary Stofa to private equi- ty firm Ratos for DKK1.1bn (€147.6m) on a cash and debt- free basis. TeliaSonera acquired Stofa, which offers broadband, telephony and TV service, in 1995. Since then, it has operated as an independent subsidiary of
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