Regional MSO Fastway plans big growth in DAS, to invest Rs. 5 bn in STBs

Punjab-headquartered Fastway Transmissions will incur a capital expenditure of Rs. 5 billion on buying and seeding set-top boxes (STBs) in Phase II, III and IV areas of digital addressable system (DAS). 

The MSO has seeded 450,000 STBs in Amritsar, Chandigarh and Ludhiana, and another one million in areas of Himachal Pradesh, Punjab and Haryana that are covered under Phase III and IV areas of DAS. 

1.5 million STBs have been seeded in Phase II, III and IV areas of DAS. Company targets to seed another two million in Phases III and IV. Investing more than Rs. 5 billion in STBs. 

Of the two million STBs, around one million will be provided by Cisco while the other one million will be from Chinese STB vendor Direct Telemedia. The STBs provided by Direct Telemedia (DTM) will have conditional access system (CAS) provided by Conax. 

In Phases III and IV, the MSO will incur a cost of Rs. 300–350 crore (Rs 3.5–4 billion) in seeding STBs that will be funded through internal accruals, loans from banks and vendor financing. 

The Phase II seeding of STBs was financed entirely through the MSO’s internal resources. However, for Phases III and IV, it had to take loans from banks and vendor financing as it was not possible for the company to make the kind of capital investment required for Phases III and IV. 

Fastway, which provides cable TV service to 119 cities and 25 districts across Punjab, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh, also plans big on broadband. The MSO has earmarked Rs. 100 crore (Rs 1 billion) for broadband for the next three years. 

With plans to lay 5,000 km of fibre across Punjab, it has already deployed a 650-km inter-city fibre network in six big cities (Amritsar, Chandigarh, Ludhiana, Bhatinda, Patiala and Jalandhar) of Punjab to provide broadband services. It will first roll out broadband services in these six main cities before expanding to other markets in Punjab. 

The current average revenue per user (ARPU) in Punjab stands at Rs. 200 in urban areas and Rs. 100 in rural and semi-urban areas. Currently, Fastway collects Rs. 100 from its local cable operators (LCOs).

Source: http://cablequest.org/news/digitization-news/item/3797-regional-mso-fastway-plans-big-growth-in-das,-to-invest-rs-5-bn-in-stbs.htmlSource: http://cablequest.org/news/digitization-news/item/3797-regional-mso-fastway-plans-big-growth-in-das,-to-invest-rs-5-bn-in-stbs.html