Ndubuisi Orji, Abuja
The Chief Executive Officer, MultiChoice Nigeria, John Ugbe, has said that the Pay -Per-View (PPV) model is not feasible in the country.
Ugbe stated this, on Monday, when he appeared before the House of Representatives Ad-hoc Committee Ad-hoc Committee investigating the non-implementation of the Pay-As -You-Go (PAYG) subscription model by satellite television operators in the country.
The MultiChoice boss noted that PPV is often confused with PAYG, which is used in the telecommunications industry, is not the right model for pay television.
He explained that whereas the PAYG is possible in the telecommunication industry, because it relies on a two-way communication system, which enables operators to determine when a consumer is connected, the service consumed and duration of connection, same cannot be said of pay television.
Ugbe added that Satellite broadcasters, unlike telecommunications firms, cannot offer Pay-Per-View television services, because satellite broadcasting is a one-way system and does not enable broadcasters to determine when a subscriber is connected and/or watching or what channel is being viewed.
According to him, “It is only in instances where there is a two-way communication between the device at the subscriber’s home and the headend of the pay-tv service provider, which will enable the provider to determine when a subscriber is connected or not, that a billing system could be designed to take into cognizance the subscriber’s behaviour.
However, Ugbe noted that for for Pay-Pay-View to be possible, there is need for a total and global remodelling of the satellite broadcasting technical and billing architecture.
“The economies of scale model employed by broadcasters mean that subscribers pay less. We are yet to see a pay TV business anywhere in the world that does PAYG in the sense intended here. We do not believe the model is technically or commercially feasible,” he stated.