SKY Pacific is a Fiji based pay TV service formerly owned by Fiji Television Limited delivering encrypted signals of 27 channels via direct-to-home (DTH) satellite on C-band to subscribers in Fiji and across the South Pacific. It is headquartered in the capital city of Fiji, Suva City with branch offices in Suva, Lautoka, Nadi and Labasa. On April 1, 2016, Digicel Fiji officially acquired the company.

History

Established in 2005 by Fiji TV as a Direct-To-Home (DTH) satellite service for Fiji and the Pacific, it started with 12 channels and eventually expanded to 16 channels in 2006.

SKY Pacific currently operates on MPEG-4 platform with its encrypted signals uplinked to Intelsat 19 from its base station in Suva and delivered to households across 13 island countries in the South Pacific including American Samoa, Cook Islands, Fiji, Kiribati (East), Nauru, New Caledonia, Niue, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga and Vanuatu.

However, the territories of French Polynesia (Tahiti), Tokelau, Tuvalu and Kiribati (West) were missed out from reaching after SKY Pacific migrated from Intelsat 18 to IntelSat 19 in June, 2013.

Digicel Buy-out

In September 2015, Digicel Fiji decided to buy out Sky Pacific for a mere FJD$5.75m[1] but the Fiji Government refused the buy-out due to Digicel not being owned by a local company. In March 2016, Digicel were finally given a 12-year licence to buy and operate Sky Pacific in Fiji provided that Digicel Fiji is barred from placing local advertisements and local content on Sky Pacific. Local content will only be allowed during natural disasters and to remove all the local content from their channels which meant Sky Pacific had to drop 2 channels, The Pacific Channel and Fiji One which Digicel complied with but they were allowed to add one of their own channels in TVWan to the lineup.[2]

Digicel Fiji finally took control of Sky Pacific on April 1, 2016.[3]

On September 11, 2023, Digicel Group filed for Chapter 15 bankruptcy in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York.[4]

Channels available

Prepay service

Kids

Documentary

Entertainment

Sports

Indian

News

Religious

Overseas affiliates

SKY Pacific has distribution deals with agents in several Pacific island countries:

  • American Samoa (Samoa Systems Incorporated)
  • Cook Islands (SKY Cook Islands Ltd.)
  • Nauru (Central Meridian Ltd)
  • Niue (Broadcasting Corporation of Niue)
  • Samoa (Polylink Telecommunications Ltd)
  • Tonga (Tonga Broadcasting Commission)

Notes

  1. ↑ shivneel. "FTV sells SKY Pacific to Digicel". skypacific.tv. Retrieved 2016-04-17.
  2. ↑ "Digicel Fiji finally awarded pay-TV licence for Sky Pacific". TeleGeography. Retrieved 2016-04-17.
  3. ↑ "April 1 Set For SKY Pacific Transition To Digicel". Fiji Sun. Retrieved 2016-04-17.
  4. ↑ "Digicel Group Files for Chapter 15 Bankruptcy in New York". Bloomberg. September 11, 2023. Retrieved September 11, 2023.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.