Reliance ADA group's BIG TV Direct To Home (DTH) service expected to capture more than 50 percent of the market share of the DTH market in Eastern India within the next 12 months and do better than other regions of the country.
It expected to capture 40 percent of the total DTH market in India, now at close to 50 lakh households, within the next 12 months.
Sanjay Behl, head for brand and marketing at Reliance Communications, said that in the East comprising West Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand and North East, around half of the 15 million colour TV households, approximately 8.25 million households, were using cable and satellite channels,and this provided great opportunity for penetration.
Most of the North East and Jharkhand did not get cable owing to geographical limitations, Behl added. Behl said that for its high definition, digitized MPEG4 service, Reliance BIG DTH had tied up for software with Nagra France, for developing and marketing the mediaguard conditional access system for digital television. Set top boxes would come from Hyundai, content and interactive application from Open TV, and head-end signalling and chipsets from Thompson through technological tie-ups.
BIG TV DTH had an arrangement with Sony Pictures and was in talks with some big Bollywood and Hollywood production houses like Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) and Buena Vista for sourcing movies, Behl claimed.
It also had in-house arrangements with Adlabs and Big Pictures for sourcing movies too.
BIG TV DTH was in talks with more producers and production houses to increase the content offering, stated Behl. Reliance BIG DTH would be made available in a price range starting from Rs 1,490 to Rs 3990, including a three-month complimentary subscription.
While initially it would bring in 200+ channels it would add another 120 more taking the total to over 350 channels by the end of this year, the highest offered by any DTH player currently.
