P

ay TV operator TelkomVision is targeting to double its subscribers in 2011 by cooperating with Irdeto, a global software security and media technology company.

“TelkomVision will use Irdeto’s Conditional Access System [CAS] in order to increase its subscribers from around 200,000 currently to 500,000 by the end of this year,” TelkomVision president director Elvizar KH said Tuesday during a press conference.

Elvizar said the targeted number of new subscribers was for both cable service TelkomVision and satellite service Yes TV.

Irdeto CEO Graham Kill said that the company, headquartered in Amsterdam and Beijing, would provide 500,000 smart cards to TelkomVision this year to support TelkomVision’s TV broadcasting.

He further said that Irdeto saw a great opportunity in the Indonesian market due to Indonesia’s increased income per capita.

“The higher GDP enables Indonesians to spend money for entertainment which will increase the market share of pay TV in the country,” he said.

According to a report by Media Partners Asia, which was presented to attendees during the conference by Irdeto, Indonesia currently has 35,000,000 TV households with a 3 percent pay TV penetration rate.

Irdeto forecasts the pay TV penetration rate in Indonesia will reach 7 percent by 2014.

In order to increase the pay TV penetration rate in the country, TelkomVision is developing more affordable products.

“TelkomVision recently released an affordable product, Hit Family, which costs Rp 55,000 [US$6.43] per month,” Elvizar said.

“Hit Family provides around 15 channels for middle and lower income households in all of the provinces in Indonesia,” he added.

Elvizar further said that TelkomVision would soon release a cheaper product to introduce pay TV broadcasts to a wider audience, without providing further details.

A subsidiary of state telecommunication company PT Telekomunikasi Indonesia (Telkom), TelkomVision is also cooperating with the Telkom Group to develop Internet protocol television (IPTV), which will be realized in the middle of this year, Mobile TV and value-added service.

TelkomVision released a bundling product, Speedy-Yes TV, in 2009 in synergy with Telkom to improve its pay TV DTH (direct to home) postpaid service targeting all of Telkom Speedy broadband customers.

TelkomVision also promotes itself as the sole operator to provide prepaid pay TV DTH services, which was released in 2007. (msa)