Tuesday, 29th April 2008

DID YOU KNOW?

* Malaysian Airlines System (MAS) tops Air Asia and Singapore Airlines in Reader's Digest's survey of most trusted brands in Malaysia. Rolex and Seiko are favourite watch brands while favourite jewellers are Habib Jewels and Poh Kong. The survey claims to identify which brands appeal most to affluent Asian consumers. The survey was carried out by The Nielsen Company through questionnaires distributed in Reader's Digest as well as through telephone interviews of randomly selected consumers. Marketing-interactive.com, 29th Apr 2008

* The action might not stand up to legal scrutiny but it seems some Chinese are fighting back against what they see as biased media coverage of the Olympic Torch Relay. Two Chinese, a New York beautician and a Beijing school teacher, were so irked by comments made on air by CNN anchor Jack Cafferty back on April 9 that they have clubbed together in order to mount a legal action in New York federal court alleging slander. Cafferty described China’s leaders as “goons and thugs”. The lawsuit claims $1.3bn (“one dollar for every Chinese”) against CNN. Another legal action is taking place in China, mounted a little more seriously by a group of 14 lawyers, arguing much the same case – but asking only for 100 Yuan ($14) each in compensation. CNN has countered by saying that Cafferty was merely expressing an opinion about China’s leadership. The Reporters Without Borders organisation says China is 163rd out of 169th in its press freedom index, in the company of other bastions of enlightenment (so we don’t get sued) such as North Korea, Burma, Vietnam, Pakistan and Eritrea. Rapid TV News, 28th Apr 2008


SPORT SHORTS

* Chinese internet portal, Sohu, that is an official sponsor of the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games, has recorded a fivefold jump in profits. Net income rose to $21.6 million from $4.5 million a year earlier, the Beijing-based company said in a statement. Traffic on the site has been boosted by Beijing Olympic news, pictures, and videos, spurring companies such as Samsung and Adidas to buy more advertising space. Sales more than doubled to $84.8 million from $33.1 million, exceeding analysts' estimates. Online coverage of the games in China has been a source of contention between Sohu.com and bitter rival Sina.com, with the former claiming to have exclusivity to carry Olympic imagery on its site. Sina.com, however, continues to carry Beijing games imagery and is planning comprehensive coverage of the event, using a 450-strong team to cover them in Chinese, English, French, German, Spanish and Arabic. State broadcaster CCTV saw off competition from both companies for the internet and mobile rights to the games in China. Sportcal.com, 28th Apr 2008

* The Indian pay-television industry is projected to generate revenues of $11.2 billion by 2012, according to a report by Media Partners Asia. By 2017, this is expected to grow to $18.5 billion, with revenues from subscriptions and advertising accounting $12.3 billion and $6.2 billion respectively. Subscriber base is also expected to expand by 137 million by 2012, and 163.8 million by 2017, with an annual growth of 10.9 per cent for the first five years and 7.2 per cent for the remaining five. In 2007, total pay-television revenues in India amounted to $5.25 billion, of which subscription revenue was $3.77 billion and advertising accounted for $1.48 billion, with a subscriber base of 81.67 million. Sportbusiness.com, 28th Apr 2008

* Belgium and the Netherlands are considering forming a new league called the BeNe Liga. The proposed competition would include best sides of each country. PSV Eindhoven, Ajax, Feyenoord, Anderlecht, Brugge and Standard Liege are likely to be involved Anderlecht board member Michel Verschueren is said to be a passionate supporter of the idea, but the mastermind behind the plan is fellow Belgian Alain Courtois. The 56-year-old politician, who is running the FIFA 2018 World Cup joint bid, has already talked about the BeNe Liga with UEFA president Michel Platini, who “reacted with enthusiasm and said that he would support a move like that.” Last year the American Major League and the Mexican Primera División formed the North American SuperLiga, while sides from Denmark, Sweden and Norway are competing in the Royal League since 2004 although the latest edition was cancelled for financial reasons. Soccer Investor, 28th Apr 2008

* USA-based cable sports broadcaster, ESPN, is reported to have completed a clean sweep of the rights for tennis' four annual 'grand slam' events by agreeing a deal to show the US Open, beginning with next year's tournament. ESPN will take over the cable rights previously held by the rival NBC-owned cable broadcaster USA Network, which are due to expire this year, according to tennisweek.com. Network rights are held by CBS. The deal follows ESPN's televising of the US Open Series, a series of tournaments leading up to the US Open itself, since its inception. It is expected that the deal will ensure greater exposure for the US Open than ever before, thanks to ESPN's ability to feature matches on any of three channels: ESPN, ESPN2 and ESPN Classic. Sportcal, 28th Apr 2008

* The number of mobile phones in use in Australia has surged to a record high and now exceeds the nation's population. For the first time, there is now more than one mobile for every Australian, with 21.26 million mobile phones now in operation - an increase of 7.6 percent from the year before. There are more than 4.5 million 3G phones in Australia, a 192 percent increase between 30 June 2006 and 30 June 2007. The number of fixed-line services, meanwhile, dropped from 11.26 million to 10.92 million. The number of payphones in operation in Australia -- both Telstra-operated and privately-operated - dropped by 8,368, to 49,862. The figures are contained in the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) 2006-07 communications report tabled in parliament today by Communications Minister Stephen Conroy. The report also shows the number of Internet subscribers has grown to 6.43 million, made up of 2.09 million with narrowband and 4.33 million with broadband connections. Znet.com.au, 29th Apr 2008

* The England and Wales Cricket Board is set to launch four new Twenty20 tournaments. According to UK press reports the ECB is looking into starting: an annual series of one-off Twenty20 matches in Antigua between England and a West Indies XI; a $1 million four-team annual Twenty20 tournament at Lord's; a revamped domestic Twenty20 league; and the Champions' League, involving the Twenty20 leaders from four countries playing for $1 million. The ECB is reported to be set to sign agreements with the West Indies Cricket Board and American billionaire Sir Allen Stanford to create two of the new multi-million dollar international Twenty20 competitions, the annual series in Antigua and the Lords based event. Sportbusiness.com, 28th Apr 2008

* Organisers of the 2012 London Olympics Games have block-booked nearly 2,000 luxury hotel rooms for international delegates attending the games at a cost of £10 million ($19.9 million). The International Olympic Committee indicated that it was surprised to hear of the block booking, believed to be the most expensive in Olympic history. The 1,925 rooms are in some of the UK capital’s most exclusive hotels, with officials being allocated suites costing up to £3,000 a night in six five-star hotels. Half the bill will be covered by the organising committee. In Beijing, officials will have only two five-star hotels, with the rest staying in more modest accommodation. Financial details of the hotel bookings were included in London’s original bid document, but last week were missing from the document on the official London 2012 website. Sportcal.com, 28th Apr 2008


MORE NEWS

Singapore/General: Online Google Searches Reflect Offline Buzz

What goes on in the real world is mirrored online and more or less in real time, according to a new hour-by-hour tracking device from Google Singapore. A month-long trial showed that searches on the Internet for the terrorist-fugitive Mas Selamat Kastari started climbing on Monday as news about how he escaped from the Whitley Road Detention Centre filtered out of Parliament. By Tuesday night, a new term, 'Wong Kan Seng', had joined a list of 20 buzz words for the day. The role and responsibilities of the Deputy Prime Minister and Home Affairs Minister had been discussed and defended by the Prime Minister earlier. Google Singapore's tracker also showed how online searches mirrored the offline buzz. In the few days before the deadline to file income tax returns, 'Iras' (the Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore), 'my tax' and 'gst offsets' were the hottest terms. Rolled out yesterday, Google Hot Trends (www.google.com.sg/trends), appears to be the most comprehensive tracking tool for local searches so far.

Previous trackers had offered only a short list of top searches and were updated only a few times a week. The online giant, which claims over 60 per cent of the market here, measured the number of times a term was searched every hour. The spikes also showed that people often went online to run their searches in the evenings, after work. Mr Derek Callow, Google's marketing manager for the region, said the buzz words were ones which showed spikes in interest, besides the usual popular terms such as 'sex'.

But if online buzz gathers fast, Google's results also showed how quickly it can fizzle. When a New Paper article on former top Hong Kong actress Yammie Lam soliciting outside a bar appeared on April 4, her name was on the list of top 20 search terms for only the next three days before dropping off. Said Assistant Professor Lim Sun Sun from the National University of Singapore: 'It's a reflection of information overload as well as the constant desire to have fresh news. 'When there is news in the traditional media and it is not enough, people go online to listen to more views and gossip.' Besides Google, Yahoo also offers a list of top search terms. On its Singapore website (www.yahoo.com.sg), Mas Selamat was the second most searched term on Wednesday afternoon after Liu Yifei, the Chinese actress starring in the Forbidden Kingdom movie. Asia Media, 25th Apr 2008

Elsewhere/General: The History Channel Celebrates Australian sports

The History Channel on FOXTEL in Australia has commissioned a new series of locally produced documentary specials titled The Spirit of Australian Sport to showcase the country’s most popular sports including Australian football, rugby league, swimming and horse racing. To be produced by Bennett Creative Services for The History Channel, the series will be presented by star athletes from the respective sport, to trace the sports’ rise to popularity as well as to feature volunteers contributing to the sport and fans attending the games.

The first of the specials, The Spirit of Australian Sport – Australian Football, scheduled to premiere in June 2008, will celebrate 150 years that the indigenous football game is played by exploring the history of ‘Aussie Rules’ through archival footage and interviews with current and ex-players, as well as fans of the game. Details to the rest of the documentary series including the line-up of athlete presenters will be announced by The History Channel in due course. Television Asia, 28th Apr 2008


ARTICLES, COMMENTS, INTERVIEWS & OPINIONS

3G Mobile Broadband Set for Growth

The Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI), and the GSMA (GSM Association), the global trade group for the mobile industry, partnered to present a seminar on “3G Mobile Broadband for All” today in Bangalore. A host of industry leaders from the mobile eco-system and India’ IT industry participated in the event. GSMA senior director of services Jaikishan Rajaraman gave the keynote perspectives on the international 3G landscape and the potential for Mobile Broadband, with particular emphasis on the social and economic advantages it would bring for India.

The agenda consisted of a number of experts from India as well as abroad who provided insights on the benefits of mobile broadband by sharing their experiences and expertise in mobile broadband deployment. These included, Vodafone Director, group public policy Neil Gough; Nokia India Head of go to market software and services, context and advertising Navdeep Manaktala; Infineon Technologies India principal - concept engineering Balachandar Santhanam; Dialog Mobile – Sri Lanka CEO Supun Weerasinghe; Qualcomm senior director-QCT Mohit Bhushan; Microsoft director of mobile operator business development David O’Byrne, and Gartner principal analyst Naresh Singh.

In his opening remarks, COAI director general TV Ramachandran said that “India represented the finest example of public-private partnership and how telecom has benefited society.” He also said that it was time now for the industry to crack the code of mobile broadband, and that in India, mobile broadband was required in the rural areas.

Ramachandran reiterated that the Industry has been able to achieve much due to the initiatives of the government, by providing a very competitive scenario, emphasis on affordability, and a conducive regulatory / policy environment for the Industry to grow at a stupendous pace.
Ramchandran also shared with the audience quotes of India’s minister of communications and IT A Raja during his inaugural address given during a similar seminar held at New Delhi 25 April. The minister had lauded the growth of the GSM industry and noted the many milestones that the industry had crossed during the last one year. April 2008 saw India become the second largest wireless market in the world. Raja emphasized on the need for the industry to now focus on improved rural penetration saying that “Mobile broadband will be the most desirable and preferred way to increase broadband penetration”. Raja announced that the Government would very shortly come out with its detailed guidelines in respect of 3G as also mobile broadband access.

The seminar included a presentation on mobile broadband applications by Ericsson, which showcased its Gramjyoti project demonstrating on how 3G mobile broadband could change and enhance the lives of people and communities. The presentation included clips on mobile education, e-governance, tele medicine and how the eco-system can be harnessed to deliver these applications on a sustainable basis. Ericsson’s head of core networks and system solutions and general manager – 3G program for market unit India and Sri Lanka Bo Ribbing said that Gramjyoti could be scaled up to cover 200,000 villages where GSM towers already existed and that there was a very viable model for using mobile communications to bridge the digital divide.

The event also included a Workshop conducted by Microsoft on “Connecting Customers & Communities”. Microsoft India’s Gupta gave the delegates an overview of Mobile Broadband applications with Microsoft and also gave a demonstration of services.

Some facts about 3G mobile broadband that were revealed at the seminar:

* 3G Mobile Broadband services are taking off exponentially in the rest of the world
* As of April 2008, there are over 168 networks in 73 countries that have opted for mobile broadband (HSPA). As of March 2008, there are more than 32 million mobile broadband (HSPA) connections worldwide, a ten-fold increase in the last one-year alone. This is forecast to grow to 700 million by 2012
* There are a number of 3G mobile broadband devices available in the market today. It is estimated that more than 470 devices had been commercialized by 102 vendors by April 2008. These devices include handsets, notebooks, USB modems, PC cards and wireless routers.
* In the last four years, the prices of WCDMA handsets have dropped by almost 80 per cent, signaling the ever-improving affordability of the service.
* It is estimated that the sale of 3G mobile broadband devices will increase from around 170 million in 2007 to nearly 800 million in 2013. Indiantelevision.com, 28th Apr 2008