Grupo Imagina gets a €355 million loan for international expansion

Iñaki Ferreras | 19-11-2012

Spain's audiovisual group Grupo Imagina (Mediapro's main shareholder) has signed a new global financing transaction with ten financial institutions worth €355 million.

Grupo Imagina will invest the capital in increasing the expansion of its presence in international markets and making this strategy more aggressive than it has been so far.

According to the company, the credit has a scheduled maturity date of 2015. The agreement was signed by CaixaBank, Royal Bank of Scotland, Banco Sabadell, Banesto, Banco Espirito Santo, Espirito Santo Investment, Banco Popular, Bankinter, Institut CatalĂ  de Finances (ICF) and Citibank.

Imagine Group members had previously signed a capital increase worth €25 million. The group's shareholders are Mediapro and Globomedia Group (51.3%), Torreal (17.1%), WPP (17.1%) and Televisa (14.5%). The company has reported that each shareholder's contribution to the capital increase was proportional to their ownership share.

Created in 2006 from the merger of Grupo Globomedia and Mediapro Group, Imagina invoiced €1,272 million in 2011 and employs over 3,400 people worldwide. With offices in Barcelona, Madrid, Bilbao, Sevilla, Canaries, Lisbon, Porto, Miami, Paris, Buenos Aires, Dubai, Doha, Rio de Janeiro, more than 30% of its turnover comes from international customers.

In recent months the group has increased its activity in international markets through its offices in Qatar, Paris, Miami, Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo, Quito, Lima, Buenos Aires, Shanghai, Hong Kong and Singapore.

Liberty Global chief wins Entrepreneur Of The Year award

Editor | 19-11-2012

Citing "foresight and ability to expand the company into regions of the world not yet explored by other cable providers," Ernst & Young has named Mike Fries, CEO of Liberty Global National, Entrepreneur Of The Year 2012 in media and entertainment.

The award is designed to recognise entrepreneurial activity by those whom E&Y regard as leaders and visionaries who demonstrate "innovation, financial success and personal commitment as they create and build world-class businesses".

In making its award to Fries, E&Y said the executive had "pushed the envelope," expanding into unchartered markets and fuelling company growth through "innovative methods".
"Mike Fries is the visionary behind the leading cable company, employing more than 21,000 people and connecting 13 countries with the digital world," said Bryan Pearce, Americas director, Entrepreneur Of The Year, Ernst & Young LLP. "With a laser focus on innovation, Fries continues to enhance Liberty Global's Internet, voice and video services, bringing an amazing entertainment experience as well as simplicity to societies across the globe."

Key among Fries' accomplishment in 2102 has been the long-awaited rollout of the Horizon connected home digital cable TV offering, allowing customers to view and share all of their content across a TV, computer, tablet and smartphone.

The Horizon TV service has been officially launched for Liberty's Dutch cable operation, UPC Netherla$$$ and has already racked up more than 50,000 subscriptions, with over 125,000 unique online users. LG will launch Horizon TV in Switzerland before the end of 2012, followed by Ireland and Germany early in 2013.

opaco to finally launch IPTV service

Iñaki Ferreras | 19-11-2012

The Paraguayan telco Copaco is hoping to have an IPTV service ready in Paraguay by the end of this month, after a delay of almost a year.

The company currently has 200 households connected to test mode. The service launch, originally scheduled for November 2011, was delayed because the fibre optic network was laid in 74 localities without a licence and was not operational until July. Since then the process has lengthened "because the company is governed by the law of contracts," explained Francisco Javier Galiano, owner of Copaco, according to Prensario Internacional.

NexTV LatAm said that the investment made by the state in retrofitting networking and purchasing equipment for online content platform is close to USD 25 million.

The Copaco IPTV packages will be available in Triple Play, including broadband, fixed telephony and pay-TV, priced at around $66 monthly. The pay-TV service will initially have about 54 SD channels, while the Premium package will offer 77 channels, including ESPN, Fox Sports, Cinecanal, NatGeo and Sony, the NSFW Venus and Playboy and about ten HD channels.

France not a priority for Netflix
Pascale Paoli-Lebailly    | 19-11-2012

US online VoD streaming service Netflix has stated that the launch of its service in France is not a priority, contradicting what Canal+ leaked a few months ago, predicting a launch for early 2013.
Speaking last week at IDATE's Digiworld 2012 in Montpellier, Netflix VP Kelly Merryman stressed that the company's aim is "to concentrate first on the 51 countries in which the platform is available and evaluate where we want to go in the coming months".
However, Merryman said she recognized all countries as future targets as Netflix wants to become a global solution.
The company also wants to consolidate its international expansion after its Q3 results showed losses on the international market and less growth than expected in certain geographical areas. Net profit fell to $8 million against $62 million the previous year.
Now involved in Europe, with bases in Ireland, the UK, and four Nordic countries, the service is not available yet in France, Spain or Italy.
Perhaps, therefore, France will first become home to Amazon's streaming offer, which is due to launch through its affiliate Lovefilm. For Netflix, there is a growing threat coming from Amazon, HBO and the RedBox/Verizon joint venture.
Last week Netflix announced that it added 1.2 million new US customers during the third quarter, bringing its subscriber total to 25.1 million, almost a third of all homes with broadband.
IDATE points out that Morgan Stanley analysts insist Netflix needs to raise prices: "The company spe$$$ more on content as a percentage of subscriber revenue (62%) than cable networks. They [Morgan Stanley] consider that Netflix's $8-per-month Internet streaming service is too cheap," IDATE said in its blog.

Most Latvian viewers only watch half of all pay channels
November 19, 2012

While over 80% of Latvian pay TV users view pay TV channels on their platform, the majority only ever view half of the channels that are available, according to a survey commissioned by IPTV provider Lattelecom from TNK.

The survey found that families tended to view fewer channels than those who lived alone, possibly because of the need to find a compromise between family members.

More important than the number of channels available to Latvian viewers were picture and sound quality, cited by 89%, price, cited by 86%, and the availability of channels with high-quality content, cited by 78%.

Nine out of ten viewers watched Latvian news programmes, and 60% watched Russian news, possibly reflecting the large number of Russian-speakers in the country, while only 30% watched other European news services. Latvian and Russian movies were the most popular content cited by viewers.

Turner selects Digital Rapids for multiscreen workflow
November 19, 2012

Digital Rapids announced today that Broadcater Turner Broadcasting System has chosen Digital Rapids’ Kayak dynamic workflow platform for multi-screen video services.

The two companies have expanded an existing relationship to collaborate on the development of advanced workflows to bring Turner’s premium content to various platforms.

“We have developed our own custom Kayak components, enabling seamless integration with Turner’s existing business systems and we are pleased to partner with Digital Rapids to further our digital encoding initiatives,” said Brooks Tobey, senior vice-president of sales solutions and multiscreen development and delivery at Turner,

According to Digital Rapids, Kayak enables media organisations to design, deploy and manage customised workflows.

D-Smart’s pay TV base up 50%
November 19, 2012

Turkish international channel takes capacity on Astra
History HD heads to Turkey
Turkish DTH platform D-Smart ended September with 815,000 pay TV subscribers, up 49% year-on-year.

The Dogan Group-owned operator also reported 819,000 free-to-air customers, giving it a total TV customer base of 1.6 million.

Total broadcasting revenues increased by 19% year-on-year to TRY803 million (€350 million).

HBO Europe names new COO
November 19, 2012

HBO Nordic strikes programming deals with FME
HBO Europe has appointed Will Harrison as chief operating officer.

Harrison will take-up the newly-created role in January and will be based in Budapest. He will report to HBO Europe CEO Linda Jensen.

Harrison has held senior roles at Disney, Time Warner, A&E Television Networks and Spectrum Strategy Consultants and has also held board appointments at HBO Central Europe, Super RTL, GMTV and FilmFlex.

He joins HBO from business consultancy Vicat Media.

Jensen said, “I am delighted to welcome Will Harrison as COO at HBO Europe; we continue to grow the company and expand our operations, and his wide international experience with some of the leading companies in the television business will prove invaluable to HBO Europe as we develop our markets and move forward.”