Home Box Office (HBO) is all set to launch on 22 March, 2000. The channel which boasts to be the first one on cable television when it started in 1972 claims to be the leader in a lot of areas not only in programming but also technical, promises the viewer a variety of entertainment right from blockbuster hollywood movies to a wide array of entertainment including various shows mini-series and concerts. The channel will follow the self-censorship mode and won‘t feature "after dark" films.

On gathering eyeballs, Anshuman Misra, Managing Director, Turner International India, says "Content and programming will drive the viewers from our competing channels".

HBO which reaches over 47 million viewers in 45 countries is confident of creating a bang in India. The channel targets the urban and the semi-urban viewers which amounts to 15 million subscribers though the management is uncertain about the time frame to reach such a vast amount of viewers. The initial target is: five million homes in the next six to seven months. The encrypted channel beaming off PanAmSat-4, will remain advertisement free for around six months and thus is not perturbed about the TRPs its programming generates.

The average per subscriber rate is Rs 6.00 but that will differ from one cable operator to another. The Sceintific Atlanta PowerVu decoders are being place with cable operators on payment of a deposit of Rs 10,000.

HBO which lacks distribution network will face a tough task of reaching the desired penetration. A distribution team of 20, along with independent distributors, is working on taking the channel further into urban homes.

Misra expects HBO to contribute two-thirds of Turner‘s subscription revenues when in full steam. It might well get that, but the channel will have a tough battle on its hands what with Star Movies all the rage and Zee Movies being launched yesterday as a free service. The additional advantage that Zee TV has is that it owns the cable TV netowrk Siticable. The third major rival is the local cable channel - airing pirated English movies - operated by the cable operator for his subscribers.

Misra is not worried however. "Our content will rule," says Misra.

The two babe-in-the-wood channels blanked out yesterday on the day of their launch for a cumulative period of 45 minutes. The first black out came between 9:30 and 10 pm and was followed by another shutdown between 11 and 11:15 pm. The channels are being beamed off.

Zee TV officials are looking into the development. However, Asiasat officials point out that an unknown carrier barged in on the same frequency of the two chanels leading to their disappearce. However, they add that they have not been able to ascertain who it was and whether the interfering transmission was intentional or accidental.

Sources, however, indicate that there was a problem during the transmission of the channels, which could be attributed to a mismatch of the symbol rate at which the transmission was being done and the symbol rate at which the Philips boxes - which are being used receive the two digital channels - were set. That resulted in a blackout.

Two English entertainment channels were launched on 15 March by Zee Telefilms chairman Subhash Chandra and Chief Executive R.K. Singh in Mumbai. Zee Movies and Zee English will be offering fierce competition to Star World, Star Movies and HBO. Or at least so hopes the Zee Telefilms management.
The two channels are aiming at the niche but relatively large English speaking and understanding audiences in India and also lovers of B-grade movies and some up-to-date series from the US market. The launch coincides with the launch of the preview broadcast of global movie champ HBO over India.

Zee English and Zee Movies are free to air currently but will be encrypted as part of the Zee digital bouquet. The company is bringing in a small batch of Philips IRDs to seed the market until the transition to a digital bouquet.

Both the channels are airing a mix of eighties, nineties, and even the most recent season‘s programming from the US. On offer are series such as ER, Friends, The David Letterman show, Here‘s Lucy, Central Park West, Three‘s Company, Charlie Chaplin, Twilight Zone etc on Zee English.

"Unlikely," says Chandra. "Ultimately it will be the consumer who will decide. And we are confident we will help him decide in our favour."

Prabhat, the Marathi channel, will be launching another regional channel on 4 April 2000. The channel called Suprabhat will have 4 hours of original programming which will be repeated throughout the day. It is being beamed off a Thaicom-3 transponder, the same one off which Prabhat is being beamed off.
The channel was on the brink of a shut down and had not been able to make payments to producers who were providing them with software. But since then an angel has stepped in and is said to be willing to back the group that has set up the channel to the hilt. A film director and producer has additionally been brought in on the company‘s board following the angel‘s entry.

With cash in hand, Deepak Agarwala, Anand Rangaswamy, Anil Shetty, Ajinkya Deo - the promoters of the channel - have been pouring it all into the Kannada service. A programming head has been hired in Banglaore and the gameplan is to launch Suprabhat by 4 April. The only thing that is to be seen is that if the channel is geared up to compete with the well established Kannada channel, Udaya, from the Sun stable.

Murdoch mania still is hot in town as speculation about what he really intends to do in the Indian market rising to a fever pitch. He had a rash of meetings on 14 March with top brass industrialists and other prominent political personalities.
Maharashtra Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh and he discussed the possibilities of investment in the Infotech and telecom area. Ministerial sources disclosed his intentions to set up a state-of-the-art fibre optic telecom carrier network in Mumbai. A possible partner for this project is InCable which has been laying a fibre optic network in the city. Star TV does not have any investments in cable TV distribution, having sold out its holdings in Siticable to Zee TV. The fibre optic project will l cater to Murdoch‘s Infotech dreams in India and facilitate e-commerce and e-education and create tremendous job opportunities, ministerial sources said.