Om Shanti Om is not the only reason we’re seeing more of Shah Rukh Khan this season. In his latest avatar as a brand ambassador for Dish TV, the Direct-To-Home (DTH) service provider, the badshah of Bollywood is seen exhorting TV audiences to stop being santusht (satisfied) with poor quality TV services. DishTV’s chief rival, Tata Sky, has its own marketing blitzkrieg. For every TV you buy, you get a discount on the DTH set-top box and dish antenna, equivalent to the size of your new TV screen.

Why are the two warring? It’s simple — they are about to face plenty of competition. Within a few months, at least four more players will launch brand new DTH services. Until recently, state broadcaster Doordarshan was the only other player in the DTH market. New entrants such as Bharti Airtel, Reliance Communications (RCOM), Sun TV and Videocon are expected to spark off price and content battles, and new marketing and distribution strategies. The grand prize is a market worth $5 billion (Rs 20,000 crore), and an estimated 40 million DTH subscribers by 2017.

DTH is seen as the successor to the virtually redundant conditional access system or CAS, which itself was introduced to combat local cable operators who under-reported subscriber numbers, sometimes by as much as 80 per cent. Under-reporting meant lower revenues for TV channels. DTH also promises superior picture and sound quality, and additional features such as games and simultaneous highlights for sporting events.

The New Picture
RCOM officials say that their DTH service, Big TV, will be launched towards the end of FY 2007-08. Industry sources put the date as early as December 2007. The same sources add that Sun TV’s new service, Sun Direct, should be in the market in February 2008. “We will launch our own DTH service towards March or April 2008 through a subsidiary, Bharti Telemedia,” says N. Arjun, executive director of DTH services at Bharti Airtel.

According to a Department of Telecommunications (DoT) official, Big TV has already received its licence to air DTH services. Sun Direct has received an in-principle acknowledgement for the same, while Videocon has received a letter of intent.