Pay-TV firms poised for big growth


From www.nationmultimedia.com/business/Pay-TV...growth-30169327.html

The pay-television business is expected to gain momentum due to the growth in cable and satellite TV audiences and interest from international content providers.
By the end of this year, the penetration of cable and satellite TV is expected to reach 80 per cent of the country's 20 million households, Niphon Naksompop, chairman of the Satellite Television Association (Thailand), said last week.

PricewaterhouseCoopers estimates that TV subscriptions and licence fees would rise 13.7 per cent annually on average, from Bt18.2 billion (US$592 million) this year to Bt28.7 billion ($932 million) in 2015.

This trend is boosting demand from local satellite-TV operators for foreign content and is luring many international channels and content providers to offer their products to local operators.

Jacelyn Kek, senior vice president for sales and marketing at HBO Asia, told The Nation that the company sees huge growth potential in Thailand as it has one of the lowest pay-TV penetrations of TV homes in the region.

In Thailand, HBO is a commercial-free movie channel and all its contents are subtitled in Thai. Sports and movies are two genres that appeal to viewers in Thailand and the appetite for Western movies here is huge, she said. TrueVisions was the only authorised cable and satellite system in the country to carry HBO Asia's bouquet of channels.

The company would continue to explore customisation of its channels with TrueVisions, for example, to provide a dual-language option for some primetime programming in original English audio as well as Thai dubbing.

"With these factors, we are confident that HBO will continue to enjoy growth in Thailand," she added.

GMM Grammy, the country's largest music and entertainment company, is now focusing on its satellite-broadcasting platform service besides providing content. It plans to introduce subscription TV via its 1 Sky set-top boxes next year.

Dew Waratangtagoon, managing director of GMM Broadcasting, said the company expects to gain 150,000 pay-TV subscribers within the coming year, excluding TrueVisions' pay-TV subscribers who number about 450,000-500,000 now.

During his trip to several European countries to introduce 1 Sky Multimedia, the operator of the 1 Sky satellite broadcasting platform, his team received positive responses from providers of TV stations and programmes to introduce their brands to the country.

However, Wichit Auraree-vorakul, executive director of Cable Television Holding (CTH), said that with the rise in demand from local satellite TV operators, overseas content producers and international broadcasting rights owners would take this chance to further raise broadcasting rights fees.

"Hence we urge the National Broadcasting and Telecommuni-cations Commission to set up an independent body like TV Pool to negotiate and buy quality TV programmes from foreign content providers to support local subscription TV operators," he said.