Subscription television in Australia consists of a dominant cable and satellite television provider Foxtel and its regional subsidiary Austar, with several smaller cable and satellite service providers operating in limited geographic areas. Other providers of Internet television in Australia offer free content or pay-per-view, but don't offer a subscription service.
In 2012, only about 28% of Australian homes had a pay TV subscription, which is one of the lowest subscriber rates in the developed world. However, this rate is expected to rise from new delivery methods IPTV and streaming television services, including Apple TV, Netflix, Presto, Stan and Quickflix.
Video Subscription television in Australia
History
Galaxy was the first provider of subscription television in Australia, launching a MMDS service on 26 January 1995. Originally Premier Sports Network was the only local channel to be fully operational, with Showtime and Encore launching in March. They were later joined in April by TV1, Arena, Max, Red and Quest. A satellite service was launched later in the year.
Optus Vision launched their cable service on 19 September followed by Foxtel on 22 October.
Northgate Communications launched their service on 13 March 1997. It was later acquired by Neighbourhood Cable.
Galaxy was closed on 20 May 1998. Two weeks later Foxtel significantly boosted its customer base by acquiring Galaxy subscribers from the liquidator of Australis Media and immediately commenced supplying programming to Galaxy's subscribers on an interim basis. In February 1999 Foxtel began offering its own satellite service to new customers.
Following the collapse, ECTV quickly signed a deal with Optus Vision. Less than two months later, it was acquired by Austar, along with its stake in XYZ. Austar replaced the ECTV packages with their own in September.
TransTV launched in 2001, beginning with VoD followed later by linear channels.
UBI World TV launched in 2004. Also in 2004, Foxtel and Austar both launched their digital offerings, with a total of 130 channels. The following year, Foxtel introduces their Foxtel iQ personal video recorder.
SelecTV launched on 12 April 2006. It ceased its English programming in late 2010.
Neighbourhood Cable with its hybrid fibre coaxial (HFC) cable networks in three Victorian regional cities of Mildura, Ballarat and Geelong was acquired by TransACT at the end of 2007. In November 2011, TransACT was acquired by iiNet Limited, which in 2015 itself became a subsidiary of TPG.
Foxtel commenced their HD service in February 2009.
Fetch TV entered the market in 2010 with a subscription service over a few ADSL2+ networks.
Maps Subscription television in Australia
Channels available
Almost all channels which currently or previously operated in Australia were available through Foxtel and Austar, being the dominant player in the market. However, some smaller competitors offer a subset of channels which are exclusive or unavailable on Foxtel services.
The majority of channels not available through Foxtel are non-English language channels. UBI World TV offers a number of ethnic satellite TV and radio channels nationwide, and other companies offer some channels via satellite, and some channels are available over the internet.
Delivery
Satellite
- Foxtel and Austar both use the Optus C1 and Optus D3 satellites.
- The various Globecast platform services use PAS 8.
- MySAT uses PAS 8.
- Jadeworld uses PAS 8.
- The various PanGlobal TV platform services use PAS 8.
- TFCDirect! uses PAS 8.
- LBF uses Intelsat 701.
- Pacific Media uses AsiaSat 4.
HFC Cable
- Foxtel use Telstra's cable in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth.
- Optus use their own cable network in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane.
- Austar provide a cable service, again via HFC to Darwin through a cable system partly owned by Austar and the Darwin City Council.
- Neighbourhood Cable (merged with TransACT) provides a TV service over their own cable to Geelong, Ballarat and Mildura.
IPTV / Internet Television
- FetchTV provides IPTV through the Optus, dodo, iiNet and Internode Internet networks, or any other internet provider when their set top box is purchased from one of their retail partners.
- TransACT's TransTV service (merged with Neighbourhood Cable) uses VDSL over a fibre-to-the-kerb network in some suburbs of the A.C.T.
- Foxtel uses the Internet to provide some extra content to its IQ2 platform. It also offers Foxtel on Xbox, a subset of Foxtel channels via any internet provider
- Several more companies offer Internet television in Australia with Pay-Per-View offerings or free streaming channels
Defunct Services
- Austar previously delivered an analogue MMDS service into selected regional areas, however the system was dumped in the late 1990s/early 2000s. Austar also briefly tested a digital MMDS service on the Gold Coast.
- TARBS leased some of Austar's metropolitan licenses for their service.
- ECTV and Galaxy also used MMDS.
- SelecTV used Intelsat 8 until administrators shut the service down in January 2011.
- UBI World TV used Optus D2 and Intelsat 8 until United Broadcasting International Pty Ltd ceased to trade on 8 June 2012.
See also
- Australian Subscription Television and Radio Association (ASTRA)
- Internet television in Australia
References
Source of article : Wikipedia
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