Africa Market Briefing | Page 8

africa_africa 30/10/2014 16:15 Page 5 Onlime ups Ku-band capacity over Africa C ommunication service provider Onlime has agreed a new three year contract with Telesat for Telstar 11N Ku-band capacity linking Europe and Africa. Onlime has KuBand coverage over the whole of Africa and the Telstar 11N footprint over the western part of sub-Saharan Africa is an important part of the jigsaw. Onlime started with pre-launch capacity on the satellite and has seen demand grow steadily over the past five years. Onlime delivers both SCPC and iDirect Evolution services on Telstar 11N to a wide variety of customers. Nigel Gibson, VP, international sales at Telesat, said the coverage and capabilities of Telstar 11N over Africa and Europe had led to steadily growing demand for the satellite across these highly competitive markets. “We are delighted to see our relationship with Telesat continuing to grow in these challenging times as Telstar 11N forms a key part of our network coverage strategy over Africa. Demand in Africa for all types of business communication services continues to exceed our expectations and Onlime plans to be at the forefront of delivering the full range of services to our predominantly enterprise customers,” added Paul Ziegler, Onlime CEO. TRACE extends reach with Multichoice rand and multimedia group TRACE’s #1 entertainment channel for sport and celebrity lovers, TRACE Sport Stars (DStv channel 188) is now available to new fans across Africa with its move to the DStv Extra, Compact and Family packages. With this new deal, TRACE Sport Stars will significantly increase its reach in the African market, underlining its point of reference for the young and the young-at-heart, while broadening its appeal to advertisers and brands. B TRACE Sport Stars was previously only available on the DStv Premium package. Laurent Dumeau, CEO TRACE Sport Stars said:“We are excited to be extending our deal with MultiChoice to bring TRACE Sport Stars unique sport and entertainment programming to a much wider audience base across Africa. With an ever-increasing demand for the TRACE brand in the region it is important we WRN Broadcast links with Voxafrica Broadcast services specialist WRN Broadcast is providing essential fibre connectivity to support 8 Africa Briefing Voxafrica, a world leading TV broadcaster of Pan African news and general entertainment. WRN Broadcast’s fully redundant fibre connectivity enables Voxafrica’s feed to reach its distribution point for onward transmission to DSTV and Canal Sat in Africa, as well as a number of IPTV platforms in France. “Reliability of service is crucial for our brand and we are pleased to be working with WRN Broadcast on this fundamental element of our broadcast chain. We also look forward to exploring how reach those fans that have not previously been able to access the channel. We are confident the channel will bring those subscribers a great mix of content where sport meets glamour and scandal, and where athletes reveal their real lives and personalities.” Aletta Alberts, GM for content at MultiChoice, said TRACE Sport Stars was a treat for sport lovers as it gives unprecedented behind-thescenes access to the lives of stars in the world of sports. “Our DStv Extra, Compact and Family customers will no doubt enjoy the range of unique programmes,” he suggested. their international network can support our expansion to new markets and platforms around the world,” commented Brice Beauvillain, technical director, Voxafrica “We believe in building long-lasting partnerships with all our customers and welcome this three-year contract to support Voxafrica’s provision of world class content to Africa and Europe. We wish Voxafrica every ongoing success,” added Tom Eyton-Jones, Business Development Manager, WRN Broadcast.