Thakur
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MUMBAI: Even as the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (MIB) has said that the seeding of set-top boxes (STBs) in Phase III has been very low, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has asked broadcasters and multi-system operators (MSOs) to get their act together for Phase III of digital addressable system (DAS) by signing interconnect agreements by 30 April.
The deadline for implementation of DAS in Phase III is 31 December 2015.
After hearing the MSOs and the broadcasters, TRAI asked the parties to fast-track the process of signing agreements.
The authority asked the MSOs to approach the broadcasters within 15 days with their business plan.
It also asked the broadcasters to respond to the MSOs within 15 days.
“We have asked the MSOs and broadcasters to sign agreements for DAS Phase III by 30 April.
They need to start discussions at least so that they can come to some kind of an understanding by April end,” a TRAI official said on condition of anonymity.
The official also said that the authority would ask broadcasters to send a bi-monthly report on the requests they had received from the MSOs to receive their signals.
“This will indicate how many MSOs have actually approached the broadcasters to sign an agreement so that they don’t hide behind the excuse that broadcasters are not co-operating,” the official added.
The meeting was held under newly appointed TRAI principal advisor SK Gupta in place of N Parameswaran who is due to retire this year.
The MSOs had raised the issue of non-signing of agreements at the sixth meeting of DAS task force on 13 March, following which TRAI decided to convene a meeting of broadcasters and MSOs to understand their issues on 18 March.
The MSOs had contended that without the input cost, they would be unable to educate consumers about the rates.
3.1 mn STBs seeded by 37 MSOs in Phase III During the task force meeting held on 13 March under the MIB additional secretary, the stakeholders were informed that data received from 37 out of 100 MSOs indicated that about 31 lakh (3.1 million) STBs had been seeded in Phase III, with about 5.5 lakh (0.55 million) boxes in their stock and about 23.5 lakh (2.35 million) under orders of purchase.
The additional secretary remarked that the seeding so far was very low as opposed to the target.
He asked the representatives of the MSOs to apprise the task force of their strategies, plans and constraints in executing the same.
MSOs complain about content cost issues in Phases III and IV The MSO representatives stated that there were issues of content costs, owing to which they were finding it difficult to plan digitisation in new areas.
Seeding plans, they said, could be firmed up only after knowing content cost.
Until that time, the MSOs could only give their seeding projections instead of seeding plans, they said.
They also mentioned that revenue from Phase III and IV areas is about 20–30 per cent of the total revenue from the country, which is why the content cost in these areas cannot be same as that in Phase I and II areas.
The MSOs want the broadcasters to keep their ambitions under check until the seeding of STBs in Phase III areas.
The issue of local taxation levied by some state governments was also raised by the MSO representatives.
They also pointed out that there were instances where local cable operators (LCOs) switched over to analogue when the digital signal to them was cut off by the MSO
Read more at:
http://www.televisionpost.com/cable/mib-says-stb-seeding-low-trai-asks-broadcasters-msos-to-sign-phase-iii-agreements-by-30-april/
The deadline for implementation of DAS in Phase III is 31 December 2015.
After hearing the MSOs and the broadcasters, TRAI asked the parties to fast-track the process of signing agreements.
The authority asked the MSOs to approach the broadcasters within 15 days with their business plan.
It also asked the broadcasters to respond to the MSOs within 15 days.
“We have asked the MSOs and broadcasters to sign agreements for DAS Phase III by 30 April.
They need to start discussions at least so that they can come to some kind of an understanding by April end,” a TRAI official said on condition of anonymity.
The official also said that the authority would ask broadcasters to send a bi-monthly report on the requests they had received from the MSOs to receive their signals.
“This will indicate how many MSOs have actually approached the broadcasters to sign an agreement so that they don’t hide behind the excuse that broadcasters are not co-operating,” the official added.
The meeting was held under newly appointed TRAI principal advisor SK Gupta in place of N Parameswaran who is due to retire this year.
The MSOs had raised the issue of non-signing of agreements at the sixth meeting of DAS task force on 13 March, following which TRAI decided to convene a meeting of broadcasters and MSOs to understand their issues on 18 March.
The MSOs had contended that without the input cost, they would be unable to educate consumers about the rates.
3.1 mn STBs seeded by 37 MSOs in Phase III During the task force meeting held on 13 March under the MIB additional secretary, the stakeholders were informed that data received from 37 out of 100 MSOs indicated that about 31 lakh (3.1 million) STBs had been seeded in Phase III, with about 5.5 lakh (0.55 million) boxes in their stock and about 23.5 lakh (2.35 million) under orders of purchase.
The additional secretary remarked that the seeding so far was very low as opposed to the target.
He asked the representatives of the MSOs to apprise the task force of their strategies, plans and constraints in executing the same.
MSOs complain about content cost issues in Phases III and IV The MSO representatives stated that there were issues of content costs, owing to which they were finding it difficult to plan digitisation in new areas.
Seeding plans, they said, could be firmed up only after knowing content cost.
Until that time, the MSOs could only give their seeding projections instead of seeding plans, they said.
They also mentioned that revenue from Phase III and IV areas is about 20–30 per cent of the total revenue from the country, which is why the content cost in these areas cannot be same as that in Phase I and II areas.
The MSOs want the broadcasters to keep their ambitions under check until the seeding of STBs in Phase III areas.
The issue of local taxation levied by some state governments was also raised by the MSO representatives.
They also pointed out that there were instances where local cable operators (LCOs) switched over to analogue when the digital signal to them was cut off by the MSO
Read more at:
http://www.televisionpost.com/cable/mib-says-stb-seeding-low-trai-asks-broadcasters-msos-to-sign-phase-iii-agreements-by-30-april/
