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Press, The; Christchurch, New Zealand

By HARGREAVES, David

Sky Television Network is planning to introduce a new set-top box that will allow broadcasts in high-definition (HD), and will also enable customers to show films and programmes downloaded from the internet.

The yet-to-be named new product will be launched by the pay-TV business early in 2008, shareholders at the company's annual meeting in Auckland were told yesterday.

Sky TV chief executive John Fellet said high-definition television was "the new frontier" of TV technology and was visually "almost like a 3D effect".

Further details of the new product would be revealed closer to the time of its launch.

Shareholders were told that the new Optus D1 satellite that will provide programme coverage for Sky TV had been launched on October 14, to replace a satellite that as chairman Peter Macourt put it, was "on its knees".

Fellet said broadcasting through the new satellite should start in the middle of next month and customers should notice "a stronger signal".

The new service would have greater capacity and more Sky TV channels would come on line gradually.

On plans for the start of free- to-air digital television in 2007, Fellet told shareholders that the way it was being promoted as, effectively the start of digital television, "will come as quite a surprise to Sky customers".

He was not able to say what the likely impact would be on Sky TV.

"But I think there will be a lot of confusion more than anything else in the first year."

He said after the meeting that global experience had shown that wherever free-to-air digital TV was launched pay-TV channels ended up with greater market penetration than they had before.

Canada's CanWest Global Communications this week ap- pointed advisers for a potential sale of its Australasian businesses, which include a majority stake in the company that runs TV3 and C4.

Sky TV bought free-to-air channel Prime earlier this year.

Asked if Sky TV might con- sider buying the CanWest assets, Fellet said he doubted if the Com- merce Commission would allow such a purchase and, in any case, "it's not our cup of tea".

"We've had no discussions about it. And we've got all the free- to-air we can handle," he said.

Yesterday's annual meeting saw only one question asked from the floor and the meeting lasted only 26 minutes.

Sky TV shares yesterday fin- ished up 9c at 555.

(c) 2006 Press, The; Christchurch, New Zealand. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.