FOXTEL

'Foxtel' is a subscription television company in Australia, formed through a joint venture between Telstra and News Corporation. It began supplying cable TV services to customers in May, 1995 with subsequent expansion allowing for satellite and cellular phone network broadcasting.
In May 1998 Australis Media, the owner of a satellite TV service known as Galaxy TV, was declared insolvent. Foxtel immediately commenced supplying programming to Galaxy's subscribers on an interim basis. In 1999 Foxtel was able to significantly boost its customer base by acquiring Galaxy TV's subscribers from the Australis Media liquidator and commenced offering its services on a satellite television platform.
Foxtel's shareholders currently comprise Telstra (50% through Telstra Media Pty Ltd) and a joint venture company (Sky Cable Pty Ltd) that is owned by News Corp (25%) and PBL (25%). It shares many features with the Sky Digital service in the UK, including IQ, the EPG and Red Button Active.
Foxtel has grown rapidly in 2007, with most of Foxtel's highest ever rating events coming this year - including the 2007 AFC Asian Cup quarter final between Australia and Japan, which drew an average of 419,000 viewers^[1] - an Australian Pay-TV record.

Contents

Availability

Services

Foxtel Digital

Foxtel iQ

Foxtel On Demand

Foxtel By Mobile

Foxtel Magazine

Encryption

Investments

Channels on the Foxtel Digital Service

References

External links

Availability

Foxtel transmits its cable service via Telstra HFC cable into the Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth metropolitan areas. Foxtel also transmits its satellite service into these cities as well as most regional areas of Western Australia and the cities of Newcastle, Central Coast and Canberra. However, satellite service is not available at user sites where Telstra cable is available. Foxtel on Mobile, launched on Telstra's Next G network in late 2006 is available within Telstra Next G HSDPA/850mhz) coverage areas, which covers 98% of the population.
Telstra's network and Foxtel were created to combat the threat posed to Telstra's local call business by the combination of Optus Vision (now known as Optus TV) content bundling with Optus' local telephony services. Foxtel was the content arm of Telstra's defence strategy. Telstra's multimedia broadband network was originally the sole delivery system.
In 2005 Foxtel and Optus Television agreed to a content-sharing arrangement. Programming competition between the two companies has now dissipated.
Austar, a regional pay TV operator, also carries most Foxtel programming. Austar sells satellite-delivered services to regional Australian markets that are not serviced by Foxtel.
Foxtel is Australia's largest pay TV operator. Its programming is currently delivered to about 1.2 million Australian homes either directly or by Foxtel's wholesale customers. Foxtel is available to over 70% of Australian homes. However, pay TV penetration into Australian homes is only about 25%, very low compared with market penetration rates in the USA (over 90%) and in European countries.
Foxtel announced its maiden annual profit in 2006, more than 10 years after it commenced services. The installation and maintenance of Foxtel services is Telstra's responsibility. In many markets Telstra has outsourced installation and maintenance to large communications contractors, including ABB Communications and Siemens-Thiess Communications Joint Venture.
In 2007, Network TEN formed an agreement with Foxtel to allow them to carry a digital version of TEN's programming. Included in the deal is EPG data which allows Foxtel IQ users to schedule recordings on TEN. Before the agreement, TEN was carried in an analogue format on Cable only.

Services

Although originally launching in 1995 with just a cable service, Foxtel has branched out into many new services since its inception.

Foxtel Digital

Foxtel launched its digital service ('Foxtel Digital') in March 2004. The service is loosely based on another of News Corporation's Subscription Providers, BSkyB. Features of the digital service include:

★ Channels with Widescreen

★ Selected movies with Dolby AC3 5.1 channel surround sound

★ Pay-per-view and 'N'ear 'V'ideo 'O'n 'D'emand services

★ Interactive television services including multiple camera angle sports, news, games and others

★ An interactive TV and AIR Radio guide.

★ "+2" (timeshift) channels of popular channels, showing programs two hours later than the original channel.
Like many other NewsCorp owned digital platforms Foxtel uses NDS the OpenTV interactive platform and runs on primarily Pace Set-top boxes.
Foxtel's satellite service transmits exclusively from the Optus C1 satellite on a frequency of 12.438GHz and adjacent frequencies. The Telstra HFC cable carries Foxtel at frequencies of approximately 560MHz (downstream) and 2.4MHz (upstream).
As of April 2007, all Foxtel subscribers are using the digital set-up, making Foxtel Digital synonymous with the standard Foxtel service.
The most commonly distributed STU for Foxtel is a Pace unit.

Foxtel iQ

Foxtel has also launched 'Foxtel iQ', a timeshifting personal digital recorder, in which subscribers are able to record programs onto a hard drive inside the set-top unit for later viewing. Foxtel iQ also allows viewers to use the rewind or pause features during television programs. Two new services, On Demand and Remote Record, exclusively available to Foxtel iQ subscribers launched in 2007. Foxtel On Demand was launched on the 8th of February and Remote Record was launched on New Years Day, 2007. This service is based on Sky+, which was launched on NewsCorp's UK Television Platform Sky in 2001.
Pace Micro Technologies are the Set Top Box provider for 'iQ' - of which, they claim that the cable version of iQ is the first DVB based Cable personal digital recorder^[2].
Foxtel intends to launch two more products in the iQ range, iQ2Go and a HD Capable Hybrid (Broadcast + Broadband) iQ^[3]

Foxtel On Demand

''See Main Article: Foxtel On Demand''
Foxtel On Demand is a service offered by Foxtel to Foxtel iQ subscribers which allows people to watch selected shows and movies whenever they want. Foxtel On Demand was launched on February 8th 2007 with a variety of programmes and included the entire second season of Love My Way.

Foxtel By Mobile

Launched in late 2006 to coincide with Telstra's new NextG 3G Mobile phone network, Foxtel By Mobile offers 12 standard channels of programming for a small subscription fee, optimised for mobile devices. At present the channels available are^[4]:

★ SKY NEWS Headlines

★ SKY NEWS Business

★ CNN

★ FOX SPORTS News TV

★ FOX8

★ THE COMEDY CHANNEL

★ MTV

★ E! Entertainment

★ Fashion TV

★ Discovery Mobile

★ Disney Channel

★ Union Extreme Sports
As of January 2007, Foxtel By Mobile includes four free bonus channels. These channels include:

★ Cartoon Network

★ TV1

★ National Geographic Channel

★ Eurosportnews
With the exception of CNN, Fashion TV, Eurosportsnews and FOX SPORTS News TV, which are direct simulcasts of the actual channel and SKY NEWS Channels which are taken from the SKY NEWS Active service, all channels are preproduced loops that do not directly correlate to the full scale satellite/cable channel. At present, a limit of 200 minutes per month, with 15 minutes per session may apply to the service, although this has not been strictly enforced.⁴

Foxtel Magazine

'Foxtel Magazine' is Australia's highest-circulating paid-for monthly magazine, reaching over 815,000 homes every month. ^[5]
Foxtel Magazine is the TV-Listings magazine for Foxtel subscribers, and offers daily listings for most of the 130 channels offered on the platform. It is the only medium that subscribers can find information and recommendations on programming for the entire month.
It is published for Foxtel by ACP Magazines, and distributed to Foxtel subscribers (who pay for this service) by postal service.

Encryption

Like the UK's Sky, Foxtel Digital utilises NDS services, including their Videoguard encryption system (for both Cable and Satellite). This is a change from previously using Irdeto and more recently Irdeto 2 on their Satellite service.

Investments

★ Adults Only (33.3%)

★ Bio.

★ The Comedy Channel

★ Crime & Investigation

★ FOX8

★ Fox Classics

★ The History Channel

★ Main Event (33.3%)

★ UK.TV (60%)

★ W

★ XYZnetworks (50%) - Joint Venture with Austar^[6]

★
★ Arena

★
★ The LifeStyle Channel

★
★ LifeStyle Food

★
★ MAX

★
★ Nickelodeon Australia (50%)

★
★ Nick Jr.(50%)

★
★ Channel V

★
★ Channel V2

★
★ The Weather Channel

Channels on the Foxtel Digital Service

Main articles: List of Foxtel channels

References

1. Japan Game a TV Record
2. Pace to Launch World's First DVB Cable PDR for payTV
3. [1]
4. Foxtel by Mobile
5. ACP Magazines - Foxtel
6. About XYZnetworks

External links

★ Foxtel's Official Website

★ Foxtel iQ Website

★ Foxtel by Mobile (Telstra NextG)