Chapter 181 Music Festival

Everyone knows that digital TV must be the future trend.

But the question is whether the initial investment in terrestrial digital TV can have sufficient returns?

In other words, the current three digital TV technologies are cable digital TV, satellite digital TV and terrestrial digital TV. Due to the topography of England, the development of cable digital TV is restricted. So can terrestrial digital TV really be able to develop in the early stage? Start investing and persist until you succeed?

Even if terrestrial digital television can eventually succeed, if it is twenty or even thirty years later, and your financial support is not available by then, and you die early on the beach, what is the point?

ITV has tried the terrestrial digital TV route before - the result was that ITV Digital eventually went bankrupt and was sold.

Facing strong competition from BSkyB in the field of satellite digital TV, ITV once planned to abandon the development of terrestrial digital TV and continue their satellite digital TV plan.

But now it seems that Digital UK, the "successor" of ITV Digital, seems to have succeeded?

At least at this time, the number of users of the Freeview platform, which is a cooperation between the BBC and SEM Group, is growing very gratifyingly.

Therefore, at this time, ITV also had the idea of ​​​​taking a stake in Digital UK.

After all, they can also see that the number of users is the most fundamental. Although Digital UK is not yet profitable, as long as the user base is sufficient, whether it is charging channel fees for the TV channels on the platform or possibly opening paid channels in the future, As long as enough TV stations join the Freeview platform, substantial profits will be made.

At this time, the senior management of ITV could not help but secretly curse the management of the former ITV Digital. They were just idiots. Why did the ITV Digital they operated went bankrupt, but after being acquired by the BBC and SEM Group, it became Digital? UK is a big success?

In fact, the failure of ITV Digital was caused by a combination of reasons, the most important of which was its rigid business approach.

First of all, under the circumstances at that time, users needed to purchase an additional set-top box to use ITV Digital's services. At that time, the price of ITV Digital's set-top box was not cheap, exceeding 200 pounds. The most important thing is that ITV Digital's technology at that time was still There are some flaws. After users use the set-top box, the program often freezes or the signal is not received directly.

In this regard, ITV Digital's response is very slow, and it often fails to help users solve the problem for ten days and a half, which makes many users give up ITV Digital's services.

Digital UK has learned a lesson in this regard. They first upgraded their technology, reducing the occurrence of many failures. And because the set-top boxes are distributed "for free", users only pay a deposit, so as long as the set-top box fails, it will not happen at all. There is no need to wait for repairs, you can immediately replace the set-top box with a new one. This kind of service also makes users rarely dissatisfied.

Of course, the most important thing is that Digital UK decisively cooperates with Chinese manufacturers, and even eventually acquired those suppliers and became its subsidiary Puma Electronics (Huaxia), so that their set-top box production can be guaranteed, and they will be able to Within a few days, the number of users of the Freeview platform reached 3 million, which is a very good start.

Although Digital UK previously gave ITV a one-year free broadcast experience in order to increase the number of channels on the Freeview platform, once the period is up, channel fees will need to be paid.

Not only ITV, but other TV stations, even the BBC and SDTV, will need to pay certain fees to Digital UK after one year. These are the sources of profits for this company.

If it were a smaller TV station, wouldn't it be a matter of paying channel fees to gain more broadcast audiences? Anyway, the more viewers there are, the more guaranteed their benefits will be, and they should pay the money.

But for a large broadcasting company like ITV, they will definitely need to participate in the future digital TV platform. As for developing it themselves? Thinking of the lessons learned from ITV Digital, they ultimately believed that it would be safer to invest in Digital UK.

Therefore, in the end, under continuous negotiations, as the users of the Freeview platform increased rapidly, ITV agreed to a valuation of 1 billion pounds for Digital UK. They used their own resources and a capital investment of 150 million pounds to obtain acquired a 15% stake in Digital UK.

In this way, after ITV joins, Digital UK, the owner of the terrestrial digital TV platform Freeview, has a shareholding ratio of SEM Group holds 51%; BBC holds 34%; ITV holds 15%...

SEM Group still holds more than half of the shares of Digital UK and has the largest decision-making power in the company.

The funds invested by ITV in Digital UK will continue to be used for the signal coverage of the Freeview platform, to build signal networks in more places in the UK, and to further promote its technology updates.

…

"We have invited bands and singers from EMI and many other labels to participate in this music festival, and even Radiohead will perform on stage..."

Summer is coming, and as Barron promised when the Rutland family's Belvoir Castle was added to the tourist destination directory of Grace Tourism Group, they will soon hold the first "Belvoir Castle" at Belvoir Castle. music Festival".

Just like Yulia said, for this music festival, they have invited many bands and singers, including the popular Radiohead at this time. I am afraid that their participation alone can attract countless music fans to Belvoir. Castle, attend this music festival.

"The layout here is good. I heard that the contestants stayed in this hotel during the previous filming of the show, right?"

Although they were talking to Yulia about the Belvoir Castle Music Festival, the two of them were now at Callan Castle, which had just finished filming the second season of the reality show "The Traitors".

The Devonshire Callan Castle Hotel here has already begun operations.

"Yes, but those players all live in ordinary guest rooms, and this ducal suite is not open to them."

There are two suites with the best views in the entire Callan Castle. Through their viewing balconies, you can not only overlook the city of Callan, but also in the other direction, located on top of the cliff, overlooking the spectacular natural scenery.

Of these two rooms, one is the master bedroom prepared for Barron, the owner of the castle; the other is the Duke's Suite at Callan Castle Hotel in Devonshire.

This is also the first time Barron has stood in this position and seen the scenery outside.

"No, Your Highness the Duke..."

When Yulia said this, Barron was hugging the woman from behind. While feeling her soft waist, he lowered his head and kissed her lips.