Knesset c’tee approves competition for Yes and Hot
The Economic Affairs Committee has approved more DTT channels for the Idan + service.
The Knesset Economic Affairs Committee today approved the expansion of Idan + digital terrestrial television (DTT) service to compete against cable and satellite services provided by Bezeq Israeli Telecommunication Co. Ltd. (TASE: BEZQ) subsidiary DBS Satellite Services (1998) Ltd. (YES) and Hot Telecommunication Systems Ltd. (TASE: HOT.B1), respectively. Minister of Communications Gilad Erdan is promoting the reform.
Idan + is free, except for the set-top box, which costs a few hundred shekels. It currently offers six stations: Israel Broadcasting Authority’s Channel 1 and 33, education station Channel 23, commercial stations Channel 10 and 22, and the Knesset Channel. The service will be expanded to include the Russian language station, Channel 9, pop music Channel 24, and sports, television serials, movies, nature, and documentary channels.
The tenders for the designated channels will be published in early 2014, and their business models will be either ads-based (free for subscribers) or subscriber-based. The Economics Committee also decided that three of the nine new Idan + channels must meet the Israeli original content requirement, at a proportion of 8-12%.
Erdan said, “The expansion of Idan + will create real competition in the multi-channel television market, which will result in lower cable and satellite subscriber prices, in the same way that mobile competition slashed monthly subscriber fees.”
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news – www.globes-online.com – on July 18, 2013