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A reliable source is telling me that Viasat, Sweden's biggest free-to-air TV and satellite pay TV operator in Scandinavia and the Baltics are planning to come to South Africa.
Whether that means that Viasat is planning to invest in making its signal with several free-to-air TV channels widely available to be received by satellite decoders in South Africa, or is planning to provide TV channels to existing TV channels or pay TV platforms, or is possibly linking and working behind the scenes with Shenzhen Media SA to make use of their dormant pay TV licence, I do not know and isn't clear yet. However, South African communication law dictates that the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (Icasa) regulates the satellite television industry. The regulatory body also regulates signals originating from outside of South Africa and has to ''approve'' that.
Since Icasa has neither issued pay TV licences since 4 years ago (Shenzhen Media SA, and Walking on Water (WOW) have licences but have failed to start commercial pay TV services), nor approved external new TV signals, it would be illegal for Viasat to beam free-to-air TV channels into South Africa to commence a satellite television service.
The only two currently legal options - should Viasat indeed be looking at South Africa - would be to supply pay as well as free-to-air TV channels to MultiChoice's DStv or On Digital Media's (ODM) TopTV - an intricate maneuvre and business deal which seems unlikely. Secondly Viasat could be working with the dormant Shenzhen Media SA (previously Telkom Media) who still has a valid pay TV licence. Viasat is owned by the Swedish conglomerate Modern Times Group. Viasat carries a range of its own channels but also transnational (what the TV industry call ''3rd party channels'') like the MTV's and Discoveries as well as the international news, music, erotic, nature, business and kids channels.
More about this development as I find out more.
