MUMBAI: Zee group's direct-to-home (DTH) company Dish TV India Ltd. holds the permission from the information & broadcasting ministry for the implementation of the Headend-In-The-Sky (HITS) platform.

"It is not the cable TV company Wire & Wireless India Ltd (WWIL) that holds the HITS licence but Dish TV," confirms a source in the company.

The operations of the HITS project, however, will rest with WWIL. "Dish TV will get some revenue flow from WWIL because of this. The teleport operations will also be with Dish TV. But HITS operations will obviously be carried out by WWIL," the source adds.


For the HITS project, Zee network is likely to use AsiaSat 4's C-band transponders. "The number of C-band transponders we are going to utilise will depend on the number of channels that we will carry on the platform. We are likely to use Asiasat 4's C-band transponders," the source adds.

HITS will enable a pan India digital rollout by providing local cable operators (LCOs) with digital signals. LCOs do not need a local digital head-end, separate subscriber management system (SMS) and conditional access arrangements. "WWIL plans to market the product across India, mainly focusing on large housing projects, townships, hotels etc. HITS can also be implemented to service smaller towns and villages, which will increase our scope. We would also be able to provide the services to the smaller LCOs and replace their redundant analog head-end with a HITS installation," says the source.

Dish TV expects the ProtoStar satellite to stabilise by August after launching in June-end. It will have all the Ku-band transponders of the satellite, enhancing Dish TV's capacity to offer more channels to its DTH subscribers.

Dish TV has already invested Rs 1 billion towards the satellite through its wholly owned subsidiary company Agrani Satellite Services Ltd, the source says.

Earlier Zee Network whole time director Punit Goenka had told Indiantelevision.com that it would be investing $64 million over a five-year period towards the satellite.

Dish TV has close to 100 Dish Care Centers (DCCs) and service franchisees, which function as its service face in the market providing installation and after sale-service. It has a 500-seat call centre, answering calls from across India, related to content provisioning, prospective customers and dealers, complaints and suggestions, service packages, etc.

With a subscriber base of 3.2 million subscribers, Dish TV has 575 distributors and around 35,000 dealers present in 4300 towns across India.