CHENNAI: The government needed to be more of a facilitator than a regulator in the pay television sector if the direct-to-home industry was to achieve its full growth potential to reach 30 million households in the next five years, said Vikram Kaushik, managing director of Tata Sky.
“Minimal regulation is needed till we reach critical mass,” he said, during a visit to The Hindu office here on Tuesday. He pleaded for the same open liberal mindset that spurred the phenomenal growth of the telecom and information technology sectors.
He pointed to the ban on adult content on TV channels as an example of unnecessary regulation in the light of the fact that DTH services offered secure parental control options to their consumers.
However, Mr. Kaushik did have a wish list of regulatory changes for the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India. To start with, he felt tariffs should be regulated to ensure healthy growth and facilitate competition in the broadcasting industry.
He appreciated the fact that the regulator had made it mandatory for broadcasters to provide DTH operators with access to their signals in a just, non-discriminatory manner. Such regulation helped in Tata Sky’s successful fight to access 15 channels from the Sun TV group – as a result of which, sales in the south had jumped, he claimed. However, he rued that wholesale channel pricing was still not being regulated.
DTH had also been saddled with the bundling of content by broadcasters, which defeated the claim of customer empowerment and flexibility, he said. This led to situations such as the one Tata Sky faced in Punjab, where Zee Turner had refused to provide signals for a channel called ETC Punjabi unless the DTH operator paid for the entire bouquet it was part of. Since ETC Punjabi broadcasts Gurbani live from the Golden Temple, the Tata Sky call centre received 36,000 calls complaining when the channel went off the air, he said. That case was now in the Punjab High Court.
The scenario was due to change soon. Last month, the regulator ruled that broadcasters must offer their channels to DTH operators on a pick-and-choose basis from December, unlike the existing all-or-nothing bouquet approach. However, a la carte pricing still allowed broadcasters to charge three times the average channel rate for an individual pick, he said, complaining that this discriminated against DTH vis-À-vis CAS or digital cable operators.
Tamil Nadu accounted for 10 per cent of Tata Sky’s daily national sales figures of several thousand, with half of those new subscribers based in Chennai, he said. Southern growth plans for the company included an expansion of the distribution network, currently present in 588 towns, as well as more content targeted at the southern market.
The Hindu : National : Tata Sky wishlist for changes
“Minimal regulation is needed till we reach critical mass,” he said, during a visit to The Hindu office here on Tuesday. He pleaded for the same open liberal mindset that spurred the phenomenal growth of the telecom and information technology sectors.
He pointed to the ban on adult content on TV channels as an example of unnecessary regulation in the light of the fact that DTH services offered secure parental control options to their consumers.
However, Mr. Kaushik did have a wish list of regulatory changes for the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India. To start with, he felt tariffs should be regulated to ensure healthy growth and facilitate competition in the broadcasting industry.
He appreciated the fact that the regulator had made it mandatory for broadcasters to provide DTH operators with access to their signals in a just, non-discriminatory manner. Such regulation helped in Tata Sky’s successful fight to access 15 channels from the Sun TV group – as a result of which, sales in the south had jumped, he claimed. However, he rued that wholesale channel pricing was still not being regulated.
DTH had also been saddled with the bundling of content by broadcasters, which defeated the claim of customer empowerment and flexibility, he said. This led to situations such as the one Tata Sky faced in Punjab, where Zee Turner had refused to provide signals for a channel called ETC Punjabi unless the DTH operator paid for the entire bouquet it was part of. Since ETC Punjabi broadcasts Gurbani live from the Golden Temple, the Tata Sky call centre received 36,000 calls complaining when the channel went off the air, he said. That case was now in the Punjab High Court.
The scenario was due to change soon. Last month, the regulator ruled that broadcasters must offer their channels to DTH operators on a pick-and-choose basis from December, unlike the existing all-or-nothing bouquet approach. However, a la carte pricing still allowed broadcasters to charge three times the average channel rate for an individual pick, he said, complaining that this discriminated against DTH vis-À-vis CAS or digital cable operators.
Tamil Nadu accounted for 10 per cent of Tata Sky’s daily national sales figures of several thousand, with half of those new subscribers based in Chennai, he said. Southern growth plans for the company included an expansion of the distribution network, currently present in 588 towns, as well as more content targeted at the southern market.
The Hindu : National : Tata Sky wishlist for changes