DIRECTV unlikely to keep NFL Sunday Ticket
- Thread starter Scott Greczkowski
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I just think Dish Network's and DTV Stream's GUI looks sleeker than DTV's. DTV's looks dated.
You mean the Hopper 3? Or the 922? I think the 922 is different from the Hopper 3. The Joey 4 combines the Hopper 3's GUI and Google TV. I think having the Network Logo's in DTV's Guide slowed it down.
This is where you are wrong. DirecTVs satellites were made specific for DirecTV’s needs. It was designed to be part of their satellite constellation. I’be not followed Dish’s satellites, but I’d assume the same.
Sure, they were built on a more or less standard bus/base model. Sort of like the platform that Ford uses for its Escape has been used by Mazda and Mercury, etc. But, each satellite has a unique set of transponders designed and aimed to fill the owner’s needs. The antennas and receivers are also designed for purpose.
Spot beams were...but dish can reuse thos same satellites or any other dbs company that has licenses for the same frequencies...most spot beams were steerable..meaning they can be re-aimed...dish and directv do lease satellites from other companies too..
Yeah, they'll definitely keep both existing systems running but only as long as they can. No point in switching out existing hardware or doing rooftop dish re-installations until it's absolutely necessary.
But here's the problem: Dish's entire satellite fleet could be defunct (out of fuel) as soon as three years from now. As I understand it, their sats were built to last 15 years (although they sometimes last longer). Among their current operating fleet, the four newest sats had launch dates of Dec. '08, Sept. '09, Mar. '10, and July '10. So the expected EOL dates for them would be Dec. '23, Sept. '24, Mar. '25, and July '25.
This is surely one of the reasons that Ergen wants to get a deal done in 2023 rather than wait until after the next big political season in '24 (when there's increased risk of politicians trying to squash a merger), which would mean not getting a deal done until '25. Because it's possible that his entire sat fleet will be kaput in '25. And even if, as is likely, some of the Dish sats last longer than 15 years, how much does Ergen want to bet on that? How close does he want to cut it before being able to shift over to the newer DirecTV sat fleet, some of which will be operational well into the 2030s?
So if Dish and DTV merge next year, look for the combined company to immediately do all *new* installs with DTV dishes pointed at the DTV sats. But my guess is that those new installs will be under the Dish brand and use Dish Hopper and Joey hardware (which may have to be tweaked in order to work properly with DTV rooftop dishes and sats).
Meanwhile, what to do about all those previously installed Dish customers who still have dishes pointed at Dish sats that could stop working in 2025? My guess is that they'll try to get as many of those customers as possible to connect their Hoppers to broadband so that their Dish service can flow to them over the internet rather than through a satellite dish. ("Get better picture quality, greater reliability in bad weather, a free year of Showtime plus a $10 credit off your bill each month for the next year if you switch to broadband delivery!")
For those existing Dish customers who don't opt to switch over to broadband delivery, they'll have to get a new rooftop dish installed. They might also have to swap out their receivers and lose their DVR recordings. And since doing a re-install is costly, Dish might either charge the customer for it (e.g. a one-time $200 charge) or make them sign a new 2-year contract to avoid the installation fee.
My guess is that the big push to convert existing Dish customers over to either broadband or a new dish would start in 2024, within a year of the merger closing.
- Nov 29, 2003
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They are going to need to if they plan on staying in business, while some Satellites may keep operating past their planned end date, not all will, as it goes longer, who knows when they can fail, but the possibility grows as they age.
Directv's Ku band satellites could be used by Dish, and vice versa (for the national beams, not the spot beams) but why? Directv has only one Ku location (ignoring 119 which is legacy MPEG2 SD locals) and there's a new satellite there, so they don't need anything from Dish.
And the idea of using Directv's satellites to bolster Dish's doesn't work because Dish has a bunch of Ku spotbeams, which Directv's satellites don't have.
The only way to do it is to operate both fleets in parallel but try to phase out Dish's two arcs as quickly as makes financial sense.
A merger both doesn't seem possible and it almost seems inevitable. There are a number of issues with such a merger, including the underlying philosophies vary greatly between the companies. It'd take a while for contracts with networks to run out, so I think there would need to be Directv and Dish standalone, even if merged for a while. Then there is the philosophy of RSNs and sports which are not reconcilable with each other. Dish is owned by a guy with a vision outside of Sat TV and has gone to great expense to see to that plan. Directv exists almost through the mere force of inertia and there appears to be no plan.
Directv appears to be the only viable option for the rural subscriber where internet and OTA provides no option to local sports. But Directv also seems to be the least likely to have a pulse in the near future as they continue to bleed subscribers. Dish has 5G and Sling, Directv has... their online version which will be competing with all the other streaming services.
Directv appears to be the only viable option for the rural subscriber where internet and OTA provides no option to local sports. But Directv also seems to be the least likely to have a pulse in the near future as they continue to bleed subscribers. Dish has 5G and Sling, Directv has... their online version which will be competing with all the other streaming services.
- Nov 29, 2003
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While true for sports, the vast majority of rural Homes do not subscribe to Sat. TV
24 million Households are in Rural areas ( out of 128 Million in the United States).
DirecTV and Dish has a total of 18-19 Million Subscribers.
If you did a 70% Urban / 30% Rural split of how many sub to Sat Service, out of 19 million Sat Subs, that is only 5.7 Million, that means 18.3 Million Rural Homes do not subscribe to Sat TV.
Even if you increased it to a 50/50 split, then means 9.5 million subscribe, 14.5 rural homes do not.
That is fine. The issue remains that millions likely need access to it... unless a space based Internet can an alternative work. I wonder if the Feds could assist with the cost of access to that by taxing the telecoms that won't invest in that area.
- Nov 29, 2003
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Just pointing out there are just not many rural subs and it should not make or break the deal.
And I agree with you on Sat. Broadband, I rather the Government give a subsidy to subscribers for StarLink instead of the Telecoms, specially since they never seem to do the build outs and yet keep the money.
Of course, define “rural”. I don’t live in a city limit, so am I “rural”. That is ONE of the dozen definitions of that that term.
Of course, if you actually understand this industry, you understand that there remain millions of homes un reachable by the internet and with either no cable, or cable run by a cable bandit which is nearly unwatchable. That is reality.
Of course, if you actually understand this industry, you understand that there remain millions of homes un reachable by the internet and with either no cable, or cable run by a cable bandit which is nearly unwatchable. That is reality.
- Nov 29, 2003
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I googled how many Rural households in the US and the answer came from the US Census.
If you have a better way or know the answer, go for it.
But no matter what you post, the vast majority do not subscribe to Satellite TV, in Urban or Rural areas, heck, Comcast is only 3 million shy of both companies sub number combined and they definitely do not reach 99% of the country as you are so fond of saying.
While Comcast's TV-customer losses accelerated this year, they're still only about half as large as the customer losses reported by DirecTV owner AT&T. Comcast is down to 20.4 million TV customers, which is higher than any other cable or satellite TV provider.Jul 30, 2020
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