When cellular telephony started in India, Bharti and Reliance took two divergent approaches towards launching cellular services — Airtel decided to focus on providing the services, leaving third party players to provide the hardware, while Reliance decided went with CDMA, a technology in which everything was more tightly controlled. Despite the obvious technological shortcomings of […]
Discovery Communications, India’s biggest provider of infotainment content, has taken broadcasting regulator TRAI to the Delhi High Court for the second time in three years for trying to bring down prices of individual TV channels. TRAI had earlier this month announced a move to force channel owners to bring the prices of their individual channels […]
Media regulator TRAI has shot off letters to most of the top cable TV feed providers in India, asking them to allow users to change their packs, and ensure that their business partners provide itemized billing to customers and pay tax to the government. It, however, remains to be seen how cable feed providers are […]
Arasu Cable, the government-owned cable feed provider in Tamil Nadu, has become the first big player to drastically reduce the monthly network charge under TRAI’s new tariff order, throwing a challenge to the likes of Tata Sky, Dish TV, Hathway and Sun Direct. Arasu Cable’s new base plan of Rs 130 contains six broadcaster packs […]
Flipkart, Amazon’s biggest competitor in India, has started rolling out a video streaming service on its mobile app similar to Amazon Prime Video and Netflix. The service is very similar to other streaming apps, and offers videos classified into different sections based on genres and languages. Both movie and non-movie content are available. Non-movie content, […]
While many English language channels have had alternate audio feeds for some markets, Discovery channel has become the first to offer feeds in all South Indian languages, including Malayalam and Kannada. Most multi-language channels come with audio feeds in four or five options – English, Hindi, Tamil, Telugu and Bengali. Languages whose speakers typically tend […]
Jio Fiber services will start in 1,600 cities across India on September 5, starting at Rs 700 per month. The plans will go up to Rs 10,000 per month. Voice and video calls will be free. Customers can buy Jio Fiber connections from September 5. Those who are willing to pay for one year under […]
Reliance Jio Chairman Mukesh Ambani said his company has come up with a set-top-box that will come with support for the existing digital cable TV business of local cable operators. This means that Jio Box will supply two services — the regular cable TV from the existing cable, and a new, high-end service via fiber […]
Jio Box, the heart of the new GigaFiber service from Reliance Jio, is built on Android TV operating system and will support some third party apps, according to sources. However, it is not clear whether the box will support all apps that run on Android TV operating system and whether it will come with Google […]
Mukesh Ambani, the chairman of Reliance Jio Infocomm and Reliance Industries, is all set to unveil attractive broadband-cum-TV plans under Reliance Gigafiber at the annual general meeting of Reliance Industries at 11 AM. The plans have been a well kept secret, but according to early indications, the company will offer free cable TV and 200 […]
Reliance Jio GigaFiber, the new wired broadband and cable TV service from India’s biggest telecom operator by volumes, is likely to offer free cable TV and high-speed broadband for Rs 500 per month. The customer is likely to have to make an initial upfront payment of around Rs 3,000, which would enable him to avail […]
Flooded by complaints about cable and DTH players not allowing consumers to change their channel packs and subscriptions, India’s media regulator has come up with a proposal to allow consumers to change their channels and packs using the TRAI website. This will be achieved through a single app — similar to TRAI’s existing ‘channel selector’ […]
The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, which recently come in for a lot of pummeling from the small cable operators for its new tariff rules, has now emerged as a savior of the same set of operators as it has dismissed government’s suggestion of fixing a ‘net worth’ requirement for cable feed providers. Ministry of […]
Hindustan Media Ventures Ltd, home to the Hindi language publications of HT Media Ltd, reported a sharp increase in its profit thanks to a substantial fall in its newsprint costs. The company’s net profit jumped to Rs 39.67 cr for the three months ended June, up from just Rs 13.20 cr in the same period […]
Gujarat-based cable feed provider and broadband operator GTPL Hathway said it will try to retain a higher share of what consumers pay every month, and is not currently looking to bring its broadband business under the Reliance Jio brand. In its cable feed business, GTPL retains only about Rs 30 out of the Rs 130 […]
GTPL Hathway, one of the country’s largest cable feed providers and the biggest MSO in Gujarat, said it expects media regulator TRAI to make further changes to the TV tariff order introduced in February this year. Speaking to analysts after announcing the quarterly earnings of the cable feed provider, officials — including MD Aniruddhasinhji Jadega […]
The new TV tariff system introduced by TRAI, which gives channel owners the full power to price their channels, does not seem to have hurt the earnings of cable networks as much as feared. It was feared that because the pricing power over channels was taken away from distributors like cable and DTH operators and […]
Having withdrawn Star Bharat from India’s largest free DTH service, Star India seems to have decided to junk its erstwhile ‘dual brand’ strategy in favor of consolidating all its channels under the flagship Star branding. Movies OK, a channel that was launched seven years ago as a cheaper alternative to Star Gold, the group’s flagship […]
PVR Pictures, the production and distribution arm of India’s largest film exhibition company, said it has signed an agreement Kumar Mangat Pathak and Abhishek Pathak’s Panorama Studios to distribute films across India. Panorama Studios has produced hits like Omkara, Special 26, Drishyam, Singham, Raid and Pyaar Ka Punchnama, since it was founded in 2005. PVR […]
Hotstar, India’s largest premium streaming platform, said 15.6 million (1.6 cr) people used its video streaming app at the same time on June 16, when India played Pakistan in the ICC World Cup in England. In all, 10 cr people logged into the service some time during that day. This is a record for the […]
