Cablevision says the outlook for its Voom service is crystal clear. But in the rapidly evolving satellite TV market, the reception has been considerably more fuzzy.
By Peter J. Howe, Globe Staff | August 22, 2004
As the owner of a 64-inch high-definition television set, Stephen Ferreira of Billerica got excited when a new satellite network called Voom started up last year, offering nearly three dozen channels of high-definition shows and movies.
All Voom needs now is about 2 million more people like Ferreira -- and fast. Nine months after Cablevision Systems Corp., the Long Island cable TV company, launched Voom at a cost of over $600 million, the service has attracted only 25,000 subscribers nationwide.
With Voom accounting for less than 1 percent of Cablevision's revenues but nearly half its most recent quarterly loss, and threatening to gobble up another $500 million this year, many Wall Street analysts have been bluntly urging Cablevision to pull the plug on the would-be third satellite TV provider.
Not that Ferreira and other fans of crystal-clear, super-sized television aren't enjoying the show. "I love being able to enjoy a breadth of high-definition content," said Ferreira, a 54-year-old regional sales executive for consumer electronics maker Pioneer North America Inc., who raves about watching HD-format Lyle Lovett and Sheryl Crow concerts and movies in wide-screen format.
Ferreira already had a DirecTV satellite dish. But once Voom cut its installation prices this spring by more than 70 percent to $200, he was happy to pay another $50 a month for a Voom dish to get access to much more HD content.
"Once you have a high-definition TV, your first inclination when you sit down is, let me see what's on the high-definition channel," Ferreira said. "If you have to settle back to standard broadcasts, it's a big letdown."
With the price for a decent high-definition TV set dropping below $1,000 from $5,000 or more just two years ago, industry forecasters predict the number of US households with HD-capable sets will soar to as many as 40 million by 2007 from 9 million today.
National networks, pushed by federal regulators to convert to a broadcasting format that supports HDTV, are also offering more prime-time content in high-definition format, as are cable movie and sports channels. But for some demanding couch potatoes, it's far from enough.
Cablevision's wager with Voom is that there are enough people clamoring for more HD content to support a third satellite TV provider alongside DirecTV Group Inc. and EchoStar Communications Corp.'s Dish Network, not to mention cable TV companies like Comcast Corp. and RCN Corp. that have begun rolling out high-definition channels.
According to market analyst Bruce Leichtman of Leichtman Research Group Inc. in Durham, N.H., 9 million HD-capable sets have been sold in the United States, but fewer than 3 million are connected to cable or satellite HD channels. Only about 1.3 million have special antennas to pull in over-the-air HD programming from the three national networks and PBS. The rest are just being used to give a better rendition of standard digital channels or for playing digital video discs (DVDs). Continued...
the rest here
http://www.boston.com/business/globe/articles/2004/08/22/hdtv_gets_a_new_player?pg=2
By Peter J. Howe, Globe Staff | August 22, 2004
As the owner of a 64-inch high-definition television set, Stephen Ferreira of Billerica got excited when a new satellite network called Voom started up last year, offering nearly three dozen channels of high-definition shows and movies.
All Voom needs now is about 2 million more people like Ferreira -- and fast. Nine months after Cablevision Systems Corp., the Long Island cable TV company, launched Voom at a cost of over $600 million, the service has attracted only 25,000 subscribers nationwide.
With Voom accounting for less than 1 percent of Cablevision's revenues but nearly half its most recent quarterly loss, and threatening to gobble up another $500 million this year, many Wall Street analysts have been bluntly urging Cablevision to pull the plug on the would-be third satellite TV provider.
Not that Ferreira and other fans of crystal-clear, super-sized television aren't enjoying the show. "I love being able to enjoy a breadth of high-definition content," said Ferreira, a 54-year-old regional sales executive for consumer electronics maker Pioneer North America Inc., who raves about watching HD-format Lyle Lovett and Sheryl Crow concerts and movies in wide-screen format.
Ferreira already had a DirecTV satellite dish. But once Voom cut its installation prices this spring by more than 70 percent to $200, he was happy to pay another $50 a month for a Voom dish to get access to much more HD content.
"Once you have a high-definition TV, your first inclination when you sit down is, let me see what's on the high-definition channel," Ferreira said. "If you have to settle back to standard broadcasts, it's a big letdown."
With the price for a decent high-definition TV set dropping below $1,000 from $5,000 or more just two years ago, industry forecasters predict the number of US households with HD-capable sets will soar to as many as 40 million by 2007 from 9 million today.
National networks, pushed by federal regulators to convert to a broadcasting format that supports HDTV, are also offering more prime-time content in high-definition format, as are cable movie and sports channels. But for some demanding couch potatoes, it's far from enough.
Cablevision's wager with Voom is that there are enough people clamoring for more HD content to support a third satellite TV provider alongside DirecTV Group Inc. and EchoStar Communications Corp.'s Dish Network, not to mention cable TV companies like Comcast Corp. and RCN Corp. that have begun rolling out high-definition channels.
According to market analyst Bruce Leichtman of Leichtman Research Group Inc. in Durham, N.H., 9 million HD-capable sets have been sold in the United States, but fewer than 3 million are connected to cable or satellite HD channels. Only about 1.3 million have special antennas to pull in over-the-air HD programming from the three national networks and PBS. The rest are just being used to give a better rendition of standard digital channels or for playing digital video discs (DVDs). Continued...
the rest here
http://www.boston.com/business/globe/articles/2004/08/22/hdtv_gets_a_new_player?pg=2