Events conspired against us and we missed last week’s TalkCentral recording. But we’re back with a bumper episode 9 of SA’s business technology podcast, and there’s plenty to talk about. Your hosts, Duncan McLeod and Candice Jones, delve in detail into Cell C’s launch of its broadband wireless network and look at how it’s taking the fight to bigger rivals MTN and Vodacom.
Browsing: Super 5 Media
Pay-TV licensee Super 5 Media has finally admitted publicly that it is facing big problems. But newly appointed director Muhammad Lockhat says the company is still working to get a pay-TV product to market, despite it recently retrenching all of its employees. It was recently granted another extension by industry regulator, the Independent Communications Authority of SA (Icasa), allowing it until February 2011 to launch a service.
Pay-TV licensee Super 5 Media has been granted another extension by the Independent Communications Authority of SA (Icasa) to launch a service. Icasa spokesman Paseka Maleka says the regulator has granted the company another six months to get a service off the ground.
The seventh episode of SA’s business technology podcast, TalkCentral, is now available for download. This week, your hosts Duncan McLeod and Candice Jones talk about the significant flow of news around MTN’s interim financial results presentation, including plans by its SA subsidiary to build a rural broadband network. We also talk about Cell C’s problems trying to trademark its new logo, communications minister Siphiwe Nyanda’s press conference on digital terrestrial television, Vodacom in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Super 5 Media’s letter to Icasa.
The apparent collapse of pay-TV operator Super 5 Media is unfortunate. It means less chance of the kind of rivalry that fosters innovation and drives down prices. At the top end of the market, however, competition to DStv may come from a less obvious source. Super 5 Media, formerly known as Telkom Media, was cursed almost from the start. When Telkom, under former CEO Reuben September, decided to end its investment, the writing was already on the wall.
The Independent Communications Authority of SA (Icasa) has received a written assurance from pay-TV licensee Super 5 Media that it is still in operation. “We received a communiqué from Super 5 Media a week before last clarifying its position in relation to recent press reports,” says Icasa spokesman, Paseka Maleka.
Episode 5 of SA’s business technology podcast, TalkCentral, is good to go. This week, your hosts Duncan McLeod and Candice Jones talk about Cell C’s dramatic overhaul, looking at its bold new branding strategy and its plans to build a powerful new network. We also talk about the apparent demise of Super 5 Media and the launch plans of Walking On Water Television, the increased bandwidth on the East African Submarine System cable, the changes to Nokia’s online music store.
South Africans’ last hope for more competition in the country’s pay-TV market, Walking On Water Television (WowTV), is gearing up to launch a satellite TV service within the next couple of months. TechCentral can reveal that WowTV plans to launch two bouquets of channels, one costing R49/month and the other R99/month. The low prices suggest the company is hoping to appeal to a broad market.
Pay-TV operator Super 5 Media on Tuesday retrenched all of its remaining employees, more than 40 people in all, and is now facing the prospect of liquidation if it isn’t able to pay one of its biggest creditors by the end of the week. TechCentral, which last week broke the news of the problems at the company, has now learnt Super 5 Media is facing a claim of as much as R25m from Rothschild, an international investment advisory company.
Telkom sold its controlling stake in Telkom Media, now Super 5 Media, for just R68m, the JSE-listed telecommunications group’s 2010 annual report has revealed. This means Telkom lost a net R403m from the failed venture. It had loaned the business R471m, which it has now written off, according to the report.