Business as usual for Sentech pay-TV

Rudolph Muller

Rudolph Muller is the editor at MyBroadband and covers telecoms and broadband news. Rudolph comes from an academic background, but left the University of...

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Sentech recently withdrew from the ICASA pay-TV licensing procedures, sparking rumors of financing difficulties and trying to save face.

A media report suggested that Sentech ‘saved itself from embarrassment by pulling out of the pay television licence race as it did not have a clear strategy on how it would source the funds needed to run the service’.

This is however not the truth says Sentech CEO Sebiletso Mokone-Matabane. She says that the company pulled out ‘for business reasons’, and that more clarity will be given in the coming weeks. She also denied that Government interfered in the process.

Have suitable license

Mokone-Matabane says that their own satellite TV offering, namely Vivid, will continue undisturbed and that she is confident that the company currently has – and will under the new licensing regime – have the rights to offer pay-TV services.

She said that the only reason why the company applied for a pay-TV license is that the invitations to apply were handed out prior to the new Electronic Communications Act. Under the new Act, Sentech already has the right to offer such a service as the ECA stipulates that new licenses will match those of an operator’s previous license.

Mokone-Matabane would not say whether the company is planning to compete more actively in the pay-TV space, but with the new wireless broadband commitments and their plans to roll out digital television next year it may have enough to do already.

On track for 2010

Sentech is directly involved in the broadcasting of the 2010 Soccer World Cup, and according to Mokone-Matabane everything is on track for Sentech to achieve its goals.

Sentech will supply each stadium as well as the International Broadcasting Centre with redundant satellite connectivity in addition to its other signal distribution duties.

Mokone-Matabane says that they are working with the Department of Communications, FIFA and the Local Organizing Committee to ensure that everything is in place come 2010.

While Sentech is not responsible for international fiber connectivity, Mokone-Matabane said that it is paramount that a new submarine fiber cable is operational by 2009 to serve the bandwidth needs of the 2010 event.

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