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Peter
| Peter Radizeski of RAD-INFO, Inc. talking telecom, Cloud, VoIP, CLEC, and The Channel.

satellite

DISHing Up a Blockbuster

April 6, 2011

DISH Networks has bought Blockbuster video from bankruptcy for a bid of $320M, according to USA Today. DISH with 14 million satellite TV subscribers has rolled out Google TV enhancements and TV Everywhere, including on Android tablets. This purchase, if the BK Court approves it, might give DISH brick-and-mortar stores to sell more DISH services and Slingboxes.

This is the second asset purchase for DISH as they bought DBSD North America, Inc., a hybrid satellite and terrestrial communications company, for approximately $1 billion in February.

ILEC News

February 16, 2011

Satellite Merger

February 14, 2011

Gary Kim writes that Echostar is buying Hughes Communications Inc. A majority of Hughes is owned by investment firm, Apollo Management IV, which, according to the BizJournal already approved the deal. Of course, the FCC has to approve the deal too.

BTW, already there is a hungry lawyer in Florida ready to sue Hughes over the deal for not getting a better deal.

Echostar is in a bidding war with Phillip Falcone's Lightsquared over two bankrupt companies, BDSD and Terrestar. These three wins would give Echostar a dominant place in satellite TV, broadband and manages services associated with its primary business of set-top boxes and Satellite Services.

This news comes right after Echostar acquired Move Networks, an adaptive streaming company for OTT Video.





Satellite Spectrum is Beachfront Property

November 17, 2010

Satellite sprectrum for broadband is a polarizing topic. HughesNet, WIldBlue (ViaSat), Skyway USA, StarBand and others have launched but can't hit scale. Between rain fade and line of sight issues, there is the perception that it is not as dependable as terrestrial modes of transit. But then, not every parcel of land in America has access to terrestrial broadband.

Losses All The Way Around

July 27, 2010

What a terrible quarter. 

The FCC is playing around with Broadband - plans, definitions and classifications. The NTIA took the summer off from its task on the broadband stimulus. 

Meanwhile, VZ releases its quarterly numbers as a loss due to pension payments and layoffs. It is planning more layoffs, because it has to cut head count in its wireline business to reflect the declining revenue. The spin was that VZW was counter-balancing any revenue losses, but with wholesale (pre-paid) cellular subs, not direct, contract ones.



Things are Round and Round

July 15, 2010

As one door closes, right? Well, WISPA is putting together a deal with DirecTV so that it's mainly residential wireless ISP base can grab some cash switching people from cable TV and Internet to fixed wireless internet access and satellite TV - kind of a cut the cable promotion. 

It used to be that independent ISP's had to worry mainly about the ILEC, but in the residential (consumer) market, the worry is cable - Comcast, Cox, TWC, BrightHouse, CableVision and Charter.

The funny thing is that some of the MSO's are collapsing their wholesale division. Just like the ILEC's, the MSO's don't really want someone else to own the customer. So even as Charter opens up its wholesale cable modem program to FISPA members, I have to wonder how long it will be in existence.

Channel Partners Expo in Boston in 2008 when the cable guys were all lined up on a panel handing out crumbs of info about their newly developed channel program, all anyone wanted to know was how much commission and would there be an added spiff.





DISH Get's DRM

November 19, 2008

So DISH Network keeps upgrading my DVR software without my asking. Tonight, I go to record a pay-per-view movie and the dialog box says, "You only have 24 hours to watch this movie before we remove it from your DVR."  Well, that stinks. We used to buy them and watch them at our leisure - usually within a week.

DISH has increased prices across the board. They will lose AT&T as a distribution arm in February of 2009.

Satellite Radio

April 2, 2008

You really should vet the material that you put in federal filings. Vonage learned that when they explained their technology enough in their IPO paperwork to enlist a patent infringement case from, well, everyone. In the Sirius-XM merger, it seems that neither company was operating within the 1997 FCC rules that established their charter. (How very RBOC of them).

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