The C-word

If I were to tell you a single company was in the process of launching the following products, who would you guess it was?

 

1. A new broadband service
2. A new video streaming service, including live TV channels
3. An Android TV set-top box
4. A "smart stick" that converts regular TV set-top boxes into smart ones that can deliver online content too

 

The disruptor with bottomless pockets filled with billions, Reliance Jio? The original telecom big daddy, and still the largest player, Bharti Airtel? Or perhaps Star TV, the 800-pound gorilla of TV programming?

 

The correct answer is Dish TV, India’s first satellite TV operator (satellite TV in India is called DTH, or Direct-to-Home). Who’da thought, eh?

 

Dish TV (and DTH) was launched in 2003 with an eye to offer better quality, pricing and programming choice to subscribers via satellite, bypassing thousands of notorious local cable operators altogether. In the 15 years since, DTH has signed up close to 70 million subscribers. If you’re thinking “that’s not a lot for a country with 1.3 billion citizens”, I’d tell you that’s not all, because the average revenue per subscriber is just around $3 a month. 

 

Earlier this year, subscriber numbers actually fell, albeit they picked up subsequently. (If it looks like a peak, quacks like a peak, and swims like a peak…)

 

In the middle of this existential angst comes the dreaded “C”-word - Convergence. The lines between ISP, cable TV, DTH, mobile operator and media companies are increasingly blurring, at least in urban households. Would consumers pay for DTH if a converged telco like Jio (which is rolling out high-speed fibre broadband and digesting the acquisition of two cable broadband companies at the same time) can offer them broadband, telephony, TV and streaming services in one convenient bundle?

 

That’s what satellite TV operators like Dish are trying to answer. By trying to disrupt, morph and cannibalise themselves before competitors do. Read Harveen’s story to find out how: https://the-ken.com/story/convergence-and-dth/