Its unofficial!!! Industry sources confirmed today that Sony Entertainment will become encrypted from 30 June.
The channel will be priced at Rs 8 per subscriber with the set top box costing the cable operator Rs 6,000 initially and a balance of Rs 6,000 to be paid after six months

Industry grist had it that SET would be following Star TV and Zee TV (encryption 1 June) and would go pay by year-end but it looks like the channel calculated there is no need to wait that long.

With the target date advanced by almost six months, whether it will manage to roll out all the boxes to its cable affiliates is not clear. But the channel‘s management had a meeting two days ago where a decision was taken to set that as the target date. The company has to import the set top boxes, which can prove cumbersome as Zee TV has found out in the past when its boxes from Philips were delayed. Even Discovery had its set tops caught up in customs for quite a while. Hopefully Sony will not be caught on the wrong foot a la Discovery.

Sony officials declined to comment, saying that an official announcement is to be made soon.

National broadcaster Doordarshan‘s Metro channel‘s light night slot will be up for bidding again, according to reports. Prasar Bharati, which got a pathetic response in January when it invited bids for the late night slot on DD Metro, has decided to call for fresh bids, it has been reported.

Prasar Bharati made a killing when it sold six "golden hours" on DD 2 for a period of one year to Australian media magnate Kerry Packer for Rs 1210 million but its auction of the 10 pm hrs to 12:30 am slot fell flat.

How the fresh call for bids will be received might also be based on what the floor price is. Earlier the rates for different half hour slots were Rs 150 million from 10 pm, Rs 75 million from 10:30 pm, Rs 20 million from 11 pm, Rs 15 million from 10:30 pm and Rs 5 million from midnight.

It remains to be seen whether Channel Nine will again be barred from bidding as was the case last time round. Prasar Bharati may just take a cue from the earlier situation where only Pritish Nandy Communications made a bid for a one 30-minute slot and have a rethink on that issue as well.

Prasar Bharati has released its DD Metro tender document. It can be picked along with application forms along with general instructions/terms and conditions free of cost from the office of Directors, Doordarshan Kendras, Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai and Chennai from 30.5.2001 to 15.6.2001 between 11.00 AM to 1.00 PM.
Interested parties can download it by clicking here on DD Metro Tender Document or by going to the DD web site (http://www.ddindia.net).

Finally closing a deal which has been in the making since last October, Star and the Koos Group of Taiwan today announced an agreement to digitise cable systems in Taiwan.

Star‘s investment in the deal will enable it to obtain an equity interest in the cable systems concerned, a company release says.

The digital rollout plan will commence in the second half of the year and the first digital cable services will be launched in early 2002. Taiwanese cable subscribers will soon be able to enjoy through digital set-top boxes high-quality digital broadcast cable signals, as well as an array of enhanced television functionalities such as parental control and a Chinese-language electronic programme guide, the release states. The digital boxes are also capable of receiving interactive premium channels and e-commerce services.

Chester Koo of the Koos Group said: "The penetration rate of Taiwan‘s cable TV is among the highest the world over - 80 per cent of Taiwanese households have cable TV. ...This partnership between Koos Group and Star is also a manifestation of the recognition we have been receiving from international media groups."

Star chairman and CEO James Murdoch said: "In Asia where digital and addressable cable systems are so rare, this deal further sets Star and our partners ahead of other players in the market. Partnering with Koos is a perfect match for us to roll out digital cable infrastructure in Taiwan, paving the way for the first large-scale market launch of digital set-top boxes in Asia and the introduction of interactive services in Taiwan, clearly setting the pace for the development of the pay TV business in the region."

It was in October that the Koos group‘s broadband Internet access and content provider GigaMedia Ltd and Star agreed to form a joint venture that would focus on developing interactive television services in Taiwan.

At the time GigaMedia and Star signed a binding memorandum of understanding to form a 50-50 jointly owned company that would operate independently.

But at the end of March the agreement was modified where Star‘s investment was to be for the digitisation of headends and the rollout of digital set-top boxes.

Although both parties claimed they remained committed to developing the Taiwanese interactive television market, they said the priority was to upgrade and digitise the network infrastructure.

In money terms this meant that the original plan where GigaMedia was to have injected $ 50 million into the interactive television project stood shelved.