REDMOND, Wash., and LISBON, Portugal, May 30, 2000 — Microsoft Corp. and TV Cabo Portugal SA, a subsidiary of PT Multimedia, today announced their plans to deploy enhanced TV services, including digital video recording functionality, based on an end-to-end Microsoft®
TV Platform software solution, to TV Cabo subscribers. This deployment is a core component of TV Cabo’s goal to be among the first to deliver enhanced television and other Internet-based services to cable customers in the world.
Leading Portuguese cable network operator TV Cabo plans to deploy advanced set-top boxes running Microsoft TV Advanced client software and the Microsoft TV Electronic Program Guide to its subscribers. In addition, it intends to deploy Microsoft TV Server to provision and manage the delivery of enhanced TV services to its customers. Trials are scheduled to start in the fourth quarter of 2000, with commercial rollout to begin in the first quarter of 2001.
Microsoft is working with network operators such as TV Cabo to extend the benefits of enhanced TV service on a worldwide scale.
“TV Cabo’s leadership in driving enhanced TV services, and its selection of the Microsoft TV Platform, illustrate a serious level of commitment to cable customers,”
said Phil Goldman, vice president of the TV Platform Group at Microsoft.
“International momentum is now very strong, and TV Cabo is an example of the trend to deliver Internet, interactive and personal TV to a worldwide audience. Opportunity abounds for network operators, interactive content developers and, most important, for TV viewers.”
In its efforts to put Portugal on the map as one of the first countries to have digital interactive TV services, TV Cabo is aggressively making progress against a demanding timetable.
“We are very pleased to have Microsoft working with us to develop digital interactive TV services through our broadband network,”
said Jose Graca Bau, CEO of TV Cabo Portugal.
“With the launch of these services, TV Cabo will be able to meet the target that PT Multimedia has committed to, and will position Portugal among the first countries to have digital interactive TV services through a bidirectional hybrid fiber coaxial cable (HFC) network.”
TV Cabo subscribers will have access to services such as video on demand, e-commerce, online banking and additional financial services interconnected with the Microsoft TV platform.
TV Cabo is considering NagraVision as conditional access provider.
About TV Cabo
TV Cabo is the leading national cable operator, with over 800, 000 subscribers, reaching a total of 2.05 million homes. TV Cabo complements its cable coverage through a multichannel digital satellite platform with over 80,000 subscribers.
The company provides a large selection of 44 basic channels to cable subscribers and over 20 channels to DTH satellite subscribers. To enhance the package of products offered, TV Cabo launched some important TV content including a premium sports channel, Sport TV; premium movie channels, Telecine 1 and Telecine 2; and a Lisbon-focused live national news and information channel, CNL.
In November 1999, TV Cabo launched NetCabo, the first real high-speed Internet access via cable-modem. This service provides Internet access to the high-end of the market at speeds around 640 Kbps, several orders of magnitude faster than conventional access. TV Cabo is fully owned by PT Multimedia.
PT Multimedia is a leading integrated media and Internet player. The company is the leading ISP (Telepac) and portal (sapo.pt) in Portugal with over 320 thousand subscribers and 32 million page views per month, respectively. Early this year, the group made its first foray into Latin America, with the acquisition of the third largest Brazilian Portal, Zip.net. PT Multimedia also has a 25 percent stake in P
á
ginas Amarelas, Portugal’s leading yellow pages telephone directory business. PT Multimedia’s controlling shareholder is Portugal Telecom.
About the Microsoft TV Platform
The Microsoft TV Platform is a comprehensive software solution for the television industry that makes television more useful, fun and engaging for consumers and creates significant new economic opportunities for network operators and their suppliers of programming, hardware and software. The client software, Microsoft TV Basic Digital for current-generation set-top boxes and Microsoft TV Advanced for advanced set-top boxes, operate a range of TV-centric appliances from set-top boxes to integrated televisions. Microsoft TV Server and Microsoft TV Access Channel Server are a pair of server software products that offer network operators the tools to provision, manage and operate a large-scale, commercial-grade enhanced TV service.
The Microsoft TV Platform supports worldwide digital TV broadcast standards, including DVB, ATSC and ARIB. It also supports commonly used Internet standards such as HTML, JavaScript and Dynamic HTML, as well as all interactive content authored according to the Advanced Television Enhancement Forum (ATVEF) specification.
About Microsoft
Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq
“MSFT”
) is the worldwide leader in software, services and Internet technologies for personal and business computing. The company offers a wide range of products and services designed to empower people through great software — any time, any place and on any device.
Microsoft is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corp. in the United States and/or other countries.
The names of actual companies and products mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.
For more information about the Microsoft TV strategy:
Note to editors: If you are interested in viewing additional information on Microsoft, please visit the Microsoft Web page at http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/ on Microsoft’s corporate information pages.
