News Headline | Indian Television Dot Com

Star TV, RPG Netcom tussle in Calcutta continues

Submitted by ITV Production on Jun 20, 2000

Even after six weeks of negotiations, the Star TV, RPG Netcom tussle in Calcutta over the carrying of revised rates for Star channels continues.

While Star TV claims that it has managed to break the ice, RPG Netcom, which has around 70% of subscribers in Calcutta city, claims otherwise. The remaining 30% subscribers are distributed among Zee TVs SitiCable and other independent cable operators.

Star TV claims that now 60% of the cable homes in the city receive Star. But RPG says that most of its cable operators have adhered to the boycott.

The blackout was called after Star TV revised the rates of its six channel bouquet including Star Plus, Star World, Star News, Star Movies and NGC to Rs 20 a month per subscriber. But officials at RPG say that their main bone of contention is not the revision of rates but that they are forced to subscribe to all the channels in the bundle and not those of their choice.

Star officials, on the other hand, claim that with the cable operators disclosing only 30% of their total subscriber base, the revision in rates should not be a problem to the cable operators.

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National Geographic's thirst for expansion continues

Submitted by ITV Production on Jun 16, 2000

News Headline

After taking a block on the Star Plus channel for airing its programme and after starting a seven hour daily Hindi feed on its own channel, the National Geographic Channel will now be looking other ways to increase its reach in the country.

To begin with, the channel is in talks with several regional channels to carry a one hour regional language block on the regional channels. It can be noted that the channel has already started a few India specific programmes on its. But these programmes won‘t exceed 20% of the total content on the channel.

Also the channel is in talks with its parent company, National Geographic Society to get in its merchandising in India. The merchandising includes the hugely popular National Geographic Society magazines, which the group is considering to re-print in India. But all this will take at least two years.

The channel is also embarking on a aggressive promotional campaign, both on air and and off air.

It can be noted that the channel has always been proactive in increasing its reach and penetration in the country. Even when the channel was launched, it had sold the digital receivers costing Rs 31,000 at Rs 12,000 to the cable operators. An estimated 1,000 receivers were given away at the subsidised rates. But once the channel reached a sizable penetration, the subsidies were done away with.

Zee English to scrap its Indian programming

Submitted by ITV Production on Jun 15, 2000

News Headline

Zee English is making a few changes in its programming and seems to be going the Star World way. It has decided to scrap its Indian programming and will now focus exclusively on foreign content. This move seems to be the channel‘s effort to become more focused on the upper crust audience.

The channel had some four Indian English shows on air. The shows were The Life Style Show, Tonight with Feroze, Spice and You Got It. The channel will get in some additional foreign programmes to fill in these spots.

It can be noted that Zee English has not achieved the kind of popularity amongst its target elite English-speaking audience that its rival channel Star World has achieved. The move to improve or revamp its programming might also attract additional advertising revenue.