SKY Network Television

SKY Network Television
Type	Public - NZX Code: SKT
Founded	1987
Headquarters	Auckland, New Zealand
Key people	John Fellet, CEO; Peter Macourt, Chairman
Industry	Subscription Television; DVD Rental
Products	SKY Television; Fatso
Slogan	Everything's In Here
Website	www.skytv.co.nz

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SKY Network Television Limited (ASX:SKT; NZX: SKT), often trading as SKY, is a New Zealand pay television service. On 31 December 2007, SKY had 720,919 subscribers, which comprises:

542,460 residential digital subscribers,
46,411 residential UHF subscribers,
118,171 wholesale subscribers, and
13,877 commercial and other subscribers.

All up, SKY was in 44.5% of New Zealand homes, making it second in popularity only to analogue television.

[edit] History

Founded by Terry Jarvis, Craig Heatley, Trevor Farmer and Alan Gibbs in 1987 as SKY Media Limited.

SKY Media Limited originally formed to investigate the possibility of beaming sports programming into clubs and pubs using high performance 4 metre satellite dishes by Jarvis and an engineering associate Brian Green but was redirected into pay television following successful bidding in 1990 for four groups of UHF frequencies in the Auckland, Hamilton and Tauranga regions.

The first SKY subscriber was former Speaker of the New Zealand House of Representatives Jonathan Hunt, according to Helen Clark, Former Prime Minister of New Zealand.

SKY rapidly won long term rights from US sports network ESPN (which became a 1% shareholder) as well as CNN and HBO providing it with a supply of sports, news and movies for three channels: SKY Sport, SKY News (a mix of CNN International and BBC bulletins) and SKY Movies (later renamed HBO, before reverting back to its original name.)

Initially only operating in the Auckland region SKY contracted Broadcast Communications to provide the broadcast service and transmission from its Panorama Road studios formerly owned by defunct broadcaster Northern Television.

Later, as funding allowed SKY extended its coverage throughout most of New Zealand, in 1994, SKY launched two further channels, Discovery and Orange. The company expanded to Hawkes Bay, Manawatu, Southland and Otago, follow by the Wairarapa, Taupo and Wanganui regions in 1995. Its final UHF expansion, in 1996, was to Taranaki, Whangarei and eastern Bay of Plenty.

In April 1997, SKY introduced a nationwide analogue direct broadcasting via satellite (DBS) service that would also give it the opportunity to offer its customers more channels and interactive options. It upgraded it to a digital service in December 1998.

The concept of a pay television service was new to New Zealand and SKY had early problems. These included viewer acceptance of subscriber television. It faced difficulty in educating retailers and customers on the use of the original decoders. However, this problem was eased with the introduction of easier-to-use decoders that allowed greater viewer flexibility.

Channels that are no longer carried by SKY TV include: Granada UKTV, Hallmark Channel, TVSN and Property TV. A SkyMail email service was also featured for a time, but was later pulled due to lack of interest, (including the wireless keyboards they had produced for it).

[edit] 2006 SKY Digital outage

The direct broadcasting satellite (DBS) service went offline just before 7 p.m. NZST (8 a.m. London, 3 a.m. New York) on March 30, 2006. The interruption affected service to over 550,000 customers and caused many decoders to advise customers of "rain fade." Due to excessive volume of calls to the SKY toll-free helpdesk SKY posted update messages on their website advising customers that they were working with Optus to restore service by midnight.

SKY gave the cause as a problem during a routine manoeuvre of the B1 satellite. Sky also blamed the total solar eclipse that occurred the same day, with the solar panels being in shadow and unable to recharge themselves. Astronomers said that it was extremely unlikely there was any connection, as the satellite would only have been in shadow for a few more minutes than usual, if even in the shadow of the Moon at all during the eclipse. ^[1] Service was resumed at 8 a.m. (9 p.m. London, 4 p.m. New York) on March 31, 2006. ^[2] SKY credited customers with one day's subscription fees as compensation for the downtime, at a cost to the company of NZ$ 1.5 million.

This outage prompted a New Zealander by the name of "Ben" to jokingly list the satellite as an item for sale on New Zealand's online-auction website TradeMe, eventually clocking up over 231000 page views and receiving much feedback and even mention in local media. It was listed with the description "One slightly used digital TV broadcast satellite. Seems to be misbehaving at the moment, unsure what the problem is, so bid at your own risk."

SKY TV is currently one of the world's fastest growing and most successful pay TV operators per capita.

SKY TV has recently completed the digitization of its studios in Auckland.

SKY provides a number of channels to TelstraClear for their Cable Television offering.

[edit] Prime Television

In November 2005, SKY announced it had purchased the free-to-air channel Prime Television for NZ$30 million. SKY uses Prime to promote its pay content and to show delayed sports coverage. New Zealand's Commerce Commission issued clearance for the purchase on February 8, 2006. ^[3]

[edit] Ownership

In July 2005, SKY Network Television Limited and Independent Newspapers Limited merged the two companies into a new company “MergeCo” which was renamed SKY Network Television Limited.^[4]. More than 40% of the equity is owned by News Corporation, an American company chaired by Rupert Murdoch.

[edit] Products and Services

[edit] Television

The following lists all current digital channels, including those available in UHF and Free To Air (FTA).

[edit] Channels Available

Digital No.	UHF No.	Channel Name	Subscription package	Widescreen	HD	Notes
000		Preview	Start Up	Yes	No	Previews SKY Box Office
001	1	TV One	Start Up	Yes	No ^[1]	Free-to-air
002	2	TV2	Start Up	Yes	No ^[2]	Free-to-air
003	3	TV3	Start Up	Yes	Yes	Free-to-air
004	9	Prime	Start Up	Yes	No	Free-to-air
005	7	the BOX	Start Up	Yes	No
006		UKTV	Start Up	Yes	No
007		Vibe	Start Up	Yes	No
008		Living	Start Up	No	No
009		Food Television	Start Up	No	No
010		Comedy Central	Start Up	Yes	No	Starts 1 April, 2009
011		E!	Start Up	No	No
012	10	C4	Start Up	Yes	No	Free-to-air
013		Fashion TV	Start Up	No	No
019	6	Māori Television	Start Up	Yes	No	Free-to-air
020	4	SKY Movies	SKY Movies	Yes	Yes
021		SKY Movies 2	SKY Movies	Yes	No
022		SKY Movies Greats	SKY Movies	Yes	Yes
023		MGM	SKY Movies	Yes	No
024		TCM	SKY Movies	No	No
025		Rialto Channel	Platinum Movies	Yes	No
028		Preview	Start Up	Yes	No	Previews SKY Box Office
030	5	SKY Sport 1	SKY Sport	Yes	Yes
031		SKY Sport 2	SKY Sport	Yes	Yes
032		SKY Sport 3	SKY Sport	Yes	No
033		SKY Sport Highlights	SKY Sport	Yes	No
034		ESPN	Start Up	No	No
035	8	Trackside	Start Up	Yes	No	Free-to-air
036		The Rugby Channel	Platinum Sport	Yes	No
040		Disney Channel	Start Up	No	No
041	7	Nickelodeon	Start Up	No	No
042		Cartoon Network	Start Up	No	No
045		Playhouse Disney	Start Up	No	No
050		Playin' TV	Add-on Channel	No	No	Interactive games channel.
051		MindGames	Add-on Channel	No	No	Interactive quiz channel.
059		Te Reo	Start Up	Yes	No	Free-to-air
060		MTV	Start Up	No	No
062		Juice TV	Start Up	No	No
063		63 - Our Music TV	Start Up	No	No
070	8	Discovery Channel	Start Up	No	No
071		ci	Start Up	Yes	No
072		National Geographic	Start Up	Yes	No
073		History	Start Up	No	No
074		Documentary Channel	Start Up	No	No
075		Animal Planet	Start Up	No	No
079		The Arts Channel	Add-on Channel	No	No
089		STRATOS	Start Up	No	No	Free-to-air
090		Sky News	Start Up	No	No
091		CNN	Start Up	No	No
092		Fox News	Start Up	No	No
093		BBC World News	Start Up	Yes	No
094		Parliament TV	Start Up	Yes	No	Free-to-air
095		CNBC	Start Up	No	No
098		Weather Channel	Start Up	No	No	Interactive weather service.
099		The Country Channel	Add-on Channel	Yes	No
110		CUE TV	Start Up	No	No	Free-to-air
111		Shine TV	Start Up	No	No
200		SKY Box Office Events	Pay-per-view	Yes	No
201-216		SKY Box Office Movies	Pay-per-view	Yes	No
217		Playboy TV	Pay-per-view	No	No
218		Fresh	Pay-per-view	No	No
219		Spice Xcess	Pay-per-view	No	No
300		KTV1	World TV	No	No
301		KTV2	World TV	No	No
302		JTV	World TV	No	No
303		CTV1	World TV	No	No
304		CTV2	World TV	No	No
305		CTV3	World TV	No	No
306		CTV4	World TV	No	No
307		CTV5	World TV	No	No
308		CTV6	World TV	No	No
309		CTV7	World TV	No	No
310		CCTV-9	Start Up	No	No
311		Real Good Life	Start Up	No	No	Digital radio channel
312		New Supremo	Start Up	No	No	Digital radio channel
315		STAR Plus Hindi	Add-on Channel	No	No
319		Preview	Start Up	Yes	No	Previews SKY Box Office
400		NZ Chart	SKY Digital Music	No	No	Digital radio channel
401		Pop	SKY Digital Music	No	No	Digital radio channel
402		Smooth	SKY Digital Music	No	No	Digital radio channel
403		Grooves	SKY Digital Music	No	No	Digital radio channel
404		Jazz	SKY Digital Music	No	No	Digital radio channel
405		House	SKY Digital Music	No	No	Digital radio channel
406		50's and 60's	SKY Digital Music	No	No	Digital radio channel
407		Party	SKY Digital Music	No	No	Digital radio channel
408		Rock	SKY Digital Music	No	No	Digital radio channel
409		Country	SKY Digital Music	No	No	Digital radio channel
410		Classical	SKY Digital Music	No	No	Digital radio channel
411		Kids	SKY Digital Music	No	No	Digital radio channel
412		Blues	SKY Digital Music	No	No	Digital radio channel
413		Theme	SKY Digital Music	No	No	Changes every month
500		Kiwi	Start Up	No	No	Digital radio channel
501		Radio New Zealand National	Start Up	No	No	Digital radio channel
502		Radio New Zealand Concert	Start Up	No	No	Digital radio channel
505		Tahu FM	Start Up	No	No	Digital radio channel
506		Calvary Chapel Radio	Start Up	No	No	Digital radio channel

^ Both TV One and TV2 broadcast in 720p, but are not available in HD on Sky.

Interactive Services:

SKYbet - interactive sports betting service.

A spinning version of the TAB SKYbet logo
Electronic Programme Guide (EPG) - Television listing information.
PlayinTV Games - video games.
MindGames - challenging video games.
Weather Channel - interactive weather maps and information.

Future Channels:

April 1, 2009 - Comedy Central
TBC - Discovery Travel & Living

[edit] MY SKY

The MY SKY logo

In December 2005, SKY released its own Personal Video Recorder (PVR), which essentially is an upgraded set top box similar to Foxtel IQ in Australia or TiVo in the U.S.. Called MY SKY, it offers viewers the ability to pause live television, rewind television, record up to two channels at once straight to the set top box and watch the start of a recorded programme while still recording the end. It also gives viewers access to a revamped Guide and the new Planner, used to plan and access recordings at the touch of a button. However the PVR box remains the property of SKY Television.

One of the advertised features of MY SKY is the ability of the system to record series of programs using the "Series Link" feature. This feature is still under development, and has proven to be somewhat unreliable in that on occasions intended future recording are not made. This has occurred since the inception of the service (December 2005) and remains today (November 2006). SKY TV say they are working to determine the cause of the random failures, and to rectify it. Soft rebooting the decoder appears to temporarily overcome the problem.

It has recently been discovered that there is software in MY SKY that after an hour of no signal from SKY then the decoder locks playback of pre-recorded programmers, this function is soon to be removed. This was discovered after the Optus B1 satellite was unable to broadcast SKY to over 600,000 subscribers. As of June 11, 2008, 31,000 MY SKY receivers are in use by customers.

This generation of box was replaced by MY SKY HDi when it launched on July 1, 2008.

[edit] High Definition

The MY SKY HDi logo

The MY SKY HDi decoder and remote control

On 1 July 2008, a new service called MY SKY HDi was launched, and is the successor to the MY SKY service released in 2006. The HD channels available are SKY Movies, SKY Movies Greats and SKY Sports 1 and 2, as well as free-to-air channel TV3. There are no plans for the HD versions of TVNZ's TV ONE and TV2 to be included in the HD package at present.

The new boxes allow connection of to up to four satellites which can work with its four TV tuner cards in any combination. Two channels can be recorded at once, while another can be watched live and the fourth is for a non-real time pay per view service. The device has a 320GB HDD however only 160GB is available for recording, the remaining is reserved for on-demand downloads. The quality of HDi SKY is 576i via component and 720/1080i via HDMI.

[edit] SKY On Demand

SKY announced late 2006 that it will be using the 30% reserved disk space in the PVR to offer a video on demand service to its My SKY customers. This service commenced in 2007 and offers 12 - 15 titles at any one time. New titles will be downloaded automatically from the Optus D1 satellite to the PVR and listed only when they are available for purchase and instant playback. SKY intends to add a remote programming feature to My Sky allowing customers to program their PVR's using the Internet or mobile phones.^[5]

[edit] SKY Mobile TV

In December, 2006, SKY announced that it will be launching a new mobile television service to Vodafone New Zealand's 3G customers. The channels include:

[edit] Publishing

[edit] SKYWATCH

The SKYWATCH Magazine

SKY also provides a SKYWATCH monthly magazine to all its customers. The latest readership survey shows that SKYWATCH has a readership of 965,000 which makes it the largest magazine read in New Zealand, and the largest monthly magazine. The magazine provides monthly listings for SKY channels, as well as highlights and features.

[edit] SKY Sport The Magazine

In January 2007, SKY launched SKY Sport The Magazine, as the published exstension of the SKY Sport television package. The magazine features articles by local and international sports writers, as well as sports photography.

SKY Sport The Magazine

[edit] Web

[edit] Fatso

Main article: Fatso (online DVD rental service)

SKY also owns an Online DVD rental service - Fatso.

[edit] SKY Online

SKY subscribers are able to download programmes to watch on their PCs if they pay an "administration charge" of $5 a month. Programmes available on SKY Online include films from four SKY movie channels, delayed sports broadcasts and a selection of programmes from SKY's start-up channel package. Customers can only view programmes if they have subscribed to the corresponding pay-TV channel.

[edit] Technical

A SKY remote control

SKY Digital subscribers get a standard 60-centimetre satellite dish installed on their home along with set-top boxes including modems for a return path.

SKY switched from the elderly Optus B1 to the Optus D1 satellite for its DBS service on 15 November 2006. Initially, SKY used vertically-polarised transponders on Optus D1 (as it had on Optus B1). However, on 31 July 2007 it moved its programming to horizontally-polarised transponders with New Zealand-specific beams to be consistent with Freeview and to gain access to more transmission capacity.

A set-top box (STB) is used to decrypt the satellite signals. Digital broadcasts are in DVB-compliant MPEG-2. Interactive services and the EPG use the proprietary OpenTV system, with operates both a UHF terrestrial pay television service on five networks of frequencies covering around 83 percent of the population and direct broadcasting satellite (DBS) service offering around 70 channels of programming.

[edit] See also

Optus Satellite Failures

[edit] References

[edit] External links

[0] New Zealand, world, sport, business & entertainment news on Stuff.co.nz

[1] CFM

[2] Commerce Commission Website - Sky cleared to acquire Prime Television

[3] CFM

[4] ttp://www.stuff.co.nz/stuff/0,2106,3887747a11275,00.html

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