Tele Columbus and Eutelsat to establish new digital TV platform in Germany

[Analoguesat]

Tele Columbus, Germany’s third largest cable operator with more than 3.7 million homes, and Eutelsat’s German subsidiary, Eutelsat Deutschland have announced they will establish a unique platform for bundling digital channels and services for German cable homes from Eutelsat’s Eurobird™ 9 satellite.

Located in proximity to Eutelsat’s flagship Hot Bird™ position, Eurobird™ 9 is fast developing into an important video neighbourhood for Europe. For Tele Columbus, the cooperation gives the company more freedom in negotiations with
content providers and further strengthens its position with end-users as a multimedia service provider.

By enabling a portfolio of basic private digital channels to be made available to Tele Columbus digital cable subscribers and other network operators, the cooperation marks a milestone in accelerating the long-awaited transition of Germany’s cable market from analogue to digital. The new platform will shortly begin testing and will officially launch in May.

Starting with two transponders, Tele Columbus plans to ramp up to five transponders hosting more than 50 digital
channels and services. The initial offer of 20 private German channels will be multiplexed, encrypted and uplinked to Eurobird™ 9 by Eutelsat.

Digital cable homes served by Tele Columbus will benefit from an extended variety of commercial channels with digital quality. The platform is also an important step in extending the digital service provided by KabelKiosk to independent cable operators and also to other interested operators. KabelKiosk already delivers 60 German and international channels to more than 230 cable network operators in Germany.

(Source: Eutelsat)