hispasat_hispasat 09/07/2014 15:38 Page 2
EXECUTIVE INTERVIEW
projects being set underway to reduce the
digital divide and cellular backhaul services
will play an important role in this area.
Furthermore, corporative satellite networks
are crucial, especially for large corporations
with many head offices spread over various
cities and countries with mobile services or in
the Oil and Gas industry.
Finally, we are confident that the satellite
broadband services and development of Ka
band will continue to grow, Hispasat being the
first operator to bring these services to Latin
America. This will make it possible to provide
users with a speed and price that make
satellites a very appealing, sometimes unique
opportunity, to grant internet access to end
consumers in many places throughout the
continent.
Are there regional ambitions beyond
your current prime positions in Iberia
and LatAm? Hispasat (or Abertis) is
often linked to other operators looking
for partners or to sell and is about to
take a major stake in Spacecom. Are
further acquisitions or joint ventures
likely to play a part in further
expansion?
Hispasat is essentially a leading operator on
the Iberian Peninsula and in Latin America
and we would like to reinforce this lead
position over the years to come. However, our
growth plan is globally ambitions and we
would like to enter new high growth potential
markets, such as those of Western Europe, the
Middle East, Africa and even Asia. In this
sense, we are not ruling out a priori any option
that may arise, which enables us to continue
growing in other regions. We are therefore
looking into Spacecom’s offer, which will open
the doors to new countries and orbital
positions and enable us to take a significant
qualitative leap in terms of size and coverage.
Hispasat has launched a full time test
channel for 4K UHD – do you think 4K
has big potential for DTH? Will it help
raise DTH share in a crowded platform
market?
We firmly believe 4K UHD is the future of TV.
It radically changes the TV viewing experience
by providing an astonishing image quality with
incredible resolution, depth and colour.
There’s an ever-increasing demand for better
quality by consumers and we are convinced
they will adopt this new paradigm as they did
with HDTV in the past, or even faster. We also
believe that satellite is the perfect fit with 4K,
as it allows to broadcast the highest-quality
content to a universal audience at the most
efficient cost: satellite led the deployment of
HDTV, and will have a leading role again for
4K. We foresee that DTH operators will be the
first to start offering 4K content to their
subscribers, differentiating their service from
other pay TV platform and indeed enhancing
CARLOS ESPINÓS
C
arlos Espinós is chief executive
officer of Hispasat. He was
named to the post in 2011, after
having served on the company´s
Board of Directors in representation
of Abertis since 2008.
He started his professional career in
the Telecommunications Division of
Andersen Consulting in 1990. In 1997,
he joined the Technology Division of
ACESA, a company specialising in the
toll road sector and the seed of what
later became Abertis, now the global
leader in infrastructure management.
In 2001, he transferred to Abertis
Telecom, the Group´s
telecommunications management
company.
There, he served as deputy general
director and managing director of the
Infrastructure Satellite Division, and he
successfully managed the Group´s
activities.
Espinós holds a degree in
Telecommunications Engineering from
the Polytechnical University of
Catalonia and has completed
coursework in Management
Development and Corporate Finance at
the IESE Business School. He has also
completed specialised courses in
Technology, Telecommunications and
Information Technology at Andersen
Consulting.
He has been a member of the board
of directors of important
telecommunications companies and
serves on the advisory boards or
executive committees of various
bodies related to the sector.
their competitive position in the market.
We have decided to help accelerating this
process by launching Hispasat 4K, a full time
promotional channel which we created as a
tool for the industry to test –and therefore to
boost the required technology developments
and integration- as well as to help players
along the value chain to create awareness of
this new TV paradigm. The channel was
launched in our European footprint from 30
degrees West position last year and few
months ago in Central and North America
through our Amazonas satellite fleet located at
61 degrees West. This initiative has been a
great success and has been backed a by several
partners (such as Thomson Video Networks,
Dolby or LG) as well as produced tens of
demos and tests events.
Hispasat’s Easy DTH proposition
demonstrates real confidence in its
advantages in certain markets; what are
your ambitions for Easy DTH and how
has the market reacted to it?
Our Easy DTH proposition combines the
satellite capacity with a flexible portfolio of
managed DTH operations (which could go as
far as a fully managed end-to-end DTH
service). There are players in the market that
are interested in launching a DTH service but
don’t have the means to deploy and operate
such a platform, and that’s precisely the need
that Easy DTH addresses.
Alongside entertainment, DTH is vital
for communication in some territories;
is Hispasat’s Kiosk Vive programme in
Colombia a model you see as viable in
many parts of the continent?
In Latin America, there is still much to do in
order to bring telecommunications services to
all citizens. It is a very large continent, with
large distances and places difficult to reach by
means of conventional on-ground networks,
where infrastructure deficit is still great. The
work of Governments is crucial for the
development of Information Society in these
countries. Indeed, I believe they are more than
aware that being connected to the world and
having access to communication services are
fundamental, in order to achieve good
economic and social growth in many
communities, especially in rural and remote
areas. Plans to expand these services are
therefore being developed, along with internet
acce