Johannesburg, 23 Feb 2007
Gateway Communications has introduced GTV, a pan-African pay-TV service, delivered by satellite.
The service will be available from the middle of 2007, with a phased roll-out across sub-Saharan Africa, the company says in a media statement.
The station, which will focus on promoting the African continent, will provide content covering a range of subjects, including sport, movies, series, music, education and religion.
It will carry international channels as well as in-house channels, including G Prime, a general entertainment and movie channel, and the G Sports 1 and G Sports 2 sports channels.
Affordable
GTV targets customers who have previously been unable to afford subscription-based services and have been limited to a small number of national free-to-air television stations.
The service will be set at an affordable subscription price to penetrate the chronically underserved African television market, the company says.
"The African market has been artificially constrained by monopoly pricing and non-relevant content," says Julian McIntyre, Gateway Communications president and GTV founder.
McIntyre says consumers across Africa want to watch the latest high-quality television programming that combines international and local content that is relevant to their lives and at a price that is comparable to a utility.
GTV will be a pay-TV platform for Africa, not simply rebroadcasts of European or South African content, he says.
Growing market
Gateway Communications says Africa represents a large and rapidly growing market for subscription TV, with over 46 million TV sets and growth of more than 10% per annum. The company says its research shows the market will increase to over $3 billion by 2015.
However, the continent also represents the least-penetrated pay-TV region in the world, with less than 1% of television-owning households in sub-Saharan Africa subscribing to pay-TV services, the company says.
By comparison, 15% in Eastern Europe, 36% in Western Europe and 93% in North America have access to pay-TV.
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