Classic Hindi movie channel Star Gold, which was launched last month, is gradually clawing its way back into Indian viewers homes, thanks to a push from the Star TV Network distribution team.

According to Star Gold head Raj Nayak, the channel was languishing for a fortnight but now has managed to get about 55 per cent penetration in Delhi and Mumbai, almost 100 per cent penetration in Kanpur and Lucknow, and 85 per cent in Ahmedabad.

"We have got a deal in place with Seven Star. We expect a resolution with InCable soon. Even RPG in Calcutta should get sorted out," he says. "I‘m looking at a penetration of about what Star World has for Star Gold in the next 15 days."

Three video on wheels (VOW) Vans are expected to go around in 70 towns in Punjab, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Bihar over the next week promoting Star Gold. "It‘s a channel headed in the right direction," he says. "We will occupy our rightful place in the cable and satellite television universe."

Channel Nine India is quite pleased as punch about the performance of its shows on the 7-9 pm block on DD2. The company has sent out release highlighting how DD shows were performing before its launch and post its launch.
The management claims to have signed some top notch advertising clients among which figure HLL, Nestle, Paras and Emami, "all of which have commited large amounts of ad-spends on our programs" says a spokesperson.

Hectic activity is on at the channel to kick off the new 9-10 pm block which is slated to launch in mid-October.
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DD performance before launch

DD peformance after launch of Channel 9.

Star Gold was launched with a lot of song and dance last month in Mumbai. The classic Hindi movie channel has, however, not received the kind of push it needed from the senior management.
Net result: several cable operators have refused it carriage. The network has not managed to strike deals with large MSOs such as RPG Netcom, InCable, and Siticable. The only cable system to have come to some arrangement with it is Hathway Cable & Datacom, and that too because of the 26 per cent equity stake that Star TV has taken in it. Other affiliates of Hathway such as WinCable and Shri Bhawani Cabletel are also showing the channel on their networks.

The Star TV management is believed to be meeting to find an out of the jam the channel has got into. It will have to work some magic to get Star Gold into viewers‘ homes.

The new Indian information and broadcasting Sushma Swaraj seems hell-bent on earning that sobriquet. Reason: not even two days into the job and she is already talking of cleaning up Indian television. DTH, the amended cable TV act, the Prasar Bharati - all these were being looked at by her afresh and it would take her a couple of weeks to make up her mind about anything, the lady said.
But for the nonce, "TV is a family medium," she said to journalists yesterday. "And my priority will be to make it that. My ministry‘s job will be to ensure that it is carried out."

Extremely noble thoughts. But wasn‘t the government supposed to set up an independent regulatory authority along with a watchdog for this very purpose? Why is the minister and her ministry coming to the forefront on this issue? A government playing conscience keeper makes for a very eerie scenario. Who knows where when the fundamentalists in the BJP may forget where the morality lines and where they begin, and whether what works well for DD works well for private satellite channels too?

Swaraj on her part tends to posture a lot. During her earlier term she ranted and raved against the former Prasar Bharati chief M.S. Gill and eventually had him sacked by reverting the pubcaster to government control and reducing the age limit that the CEO could run it. At the same time she screamed against the obscenity on Indian television, saying she would have heads roll. But she did very little about it. Additionally, she drew up what would become a phased policy on uplinking, opening up uplinking to even foreign companies from Indian soil. She also allowed foreign ad agencies to own Indian ad agencies.

Swaraj seems to want to appear to be a cross old Aunt, but one who is jolly good at heart. Just a bit like Uncle George in Dennis the Menace comics. She will surely give some executives in foreign channels heart burn. In the long run however she should turn out all right. That‘s if she survives her full term.

Another bird has gone up in the sky with its eye on the Indian market. Americom Asia-Pacific (AAP)‘s GE-1A satellite was launched successfully yesterday by ILS from from the Cosmodrome in Baikonur, Kazakhstan, singalling the operational beginning of Americom Asia-Pacific, the joint venture formed by GE Americom and Lockheed Martin Global Telecommunications.
Andreas Georghiou, AAP‘s President who also serves as GE Americom‘s Senior Vice President of Global Satellite Services, said "With next month‘s operation of GE-1A, we look forward to realizing our plan of bringing high-quality Ku-band satellite service to this important region."

GE-1A, a powerful K[J Purvis2]popou-band satellite, is to be be located at 108.2 degrees east longitude and is expected to provide services via three beams to greater China, south Asia including India, and northeast Asia and the Philippines. The spacecraft has 28 active 36 MHz Ku-band transponders with 120-watt TWTAs. The GE-1A satellite is an A2100AX spacecraft, manufactured by Lockheed Martin, for a minimum useful life of 15 years.

The satellite is expected to be fully operational by November 15, 2000, and will deliver Internet applications, VSAT, data and telecommunications services, cable and broadcast programming.

AAP was formed in 1998, to provide high-powered capacity and state-of-the-art services to ISP‘s and their customers, programmers, telcos and carriers throughout the Asia-Pacific region. It has established its headquarters in Singapore with additional sales and technical support teams in Beijing and New Delhi.

ESPN announced the launch of the world‘s most advanced scoring and analysis graphical system, NAMADGI with the ICC Knockout tournament beginning October 3.The Namadgi system named after a hillock near Canberra, Australia was created over an 18 month period by a team of software developers headed by Steven Hodgeman and Donavan Edge and ESPN ‘s producer Joy Bhattacharya. The analysis system can provide 260 charts of the live day‘s play, based on 11 parameters each from bowling, batting and fielding. For instance, the bowling data will be compiled including where the ball was, what it did off the air, the bounce of the ball, and what it did off the pitch. The qualitative analysis will emanate based on the weightage factor, which team plays who, and whether the matches are played at home, on neutral ground or away from home.

Manu Sawhney, Managing Director of ESPN Software Ltd. said that the Namadgi was a fourth generation system, having successfully passed through testing score cards, ball by ball, with two or three variables, and now with 11 variables for batting, bowling and fielding. The analysis system will be integrated with the Cricket Ratings system in partnership with Samsung India. The live ball by ball analysis will be framed over an 18 month period, and include data from all International cricket matches played by teams telecast on ESPN, Star Sports and other channels. "The Namadgi scoring and graphical system will raise the bar in cricket analysis by offering players, commentators and viewers a tremendous opportunity, "Sawhney pointed out." For us, it will offer various avenues for clients to be associated with." Added well known commentator Harsha Bhogle, "the Namadgi data will help commentators frame a complete picture of the match."

ESPN will include an interactive element at the ICC Tournament as well. Viewers can ask questions to expert commentators on the game situation, player performance, team strategy or forecast via live phone-ins. ESPN producer Bhatacharya said that the data and analysis will be available on the Internet at www.espnstarsports.com for consumer and corporate use.