PanAmSat Expands Australia's Premier Ethnic TV Bouquet With Addition of Japan's NHK World Premium

PanAmSat Expands Australia's Premier Ethnic TV Bouquet With Addition of Japan's NHK World Premium

SYDNEY, Australia, July 5 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- PanAmSat (NYSE:PA) today announced that PanGlobal TV, a joint marketing alliance between PanAmSat and Globecast Australia, had signed a multi-year agreement with TV Oceania to bring Japan Broadcasting Corporation (NHK)'s NHK World Premium service to Australia. Launched in 2004, PanGlobal TV is a direct-to-home (DTH) multi- ethnic programming platform that reaches tens of thousands across the Australian continent. It is one of nine DTH platforms that PanAmSat supports around the globe.

"NHK has long been a valued customer on PanAmSat's global fleet. By extending its agreement with PanAmSat to include the PanGlobal platform, NHK will now have access to Australia's sizeable Japanese-speaking population," said David Ball, vice president, Asia Pacific, PanAmSat. "The addition of NHK World Premium reaffirms our commitment to bring varied and diverse programming to Australia's multi-ethnic viewers. We are very excited to be able to facilitate NHK's reentry into the Australian market."

PanGlobal TV offers 17 different channels of multi-ethnic programming, including NHK World Premium, to viewers across Australia. The line up includes MySAT, the Arabic Pay TV service which carries ART, LBC, Al Jazeera, ART Movies, Future TV, MBC and Noursat. It also features Horizon World Plus TV Pty Ltd which distributes a bouquet of four Russian television channels: RTVi, Teleklub/Detski Mir, Nashe Kino and RTR Planeta. It also hosts TV Plus which offers Serbian services Pink Plus, ExtraTV, BN and BHTV1.

"Through PanAmSat, we have been able to effectively and reliably reach viewers from Rio de Janeiro to San Francisco on the PAS-8, PAS-9 and PAS-10 satellites. Now, through its PanGlobal TV platform, we are able to serve subscribers in the Australian market with the finest programming from Japan," said Mr. Shuichiro Sunohara, deputy director, International Planning and Broadcasting, NHK.

Distributed on the PanGlobal TV Platform via the Australia beam of PAS-8, the NHK signal will be received by PanAmSat's Napa teleport, which will turn the signal to the PanGlobal TV platform for delivery straight to viewers' homes across Australia. NHK's local partner, TV Oceania, will handle the retail aspects of the direct-to-home distribution such as subscriber management and fulfillment. NHK World Premium began broadcasting on July 1.

PanGlobal TV is a joint marketing alliance between PanAmSat and GlobeCast Australia, which offers a range of transmission services to international broadcasters who wish to reach Australia's diverse multi-cultural communities. The service transmits digital television channel signals from either GlobeCast Australia's Sydney teleport or the PanAmSat Napa Valley, California teleport to the PAS-8 Ku-band Australia beam. The teleports offer digital encoding, signal processing and transport services in addition to the uplink service to the satellite. PanGlobal TV offers backhaul to either the Napa teleport or the Sydney teleport by satellite, fiber or hybrid satellite/fiber contribution.

About GlobeCast Australia

GlobeCast Australia is the Sydney-based associate of GlobeCast International. The Company is a JV between GlobeCast International, a subsidiary of France Telecom, and Australian Shareholders Capital-Investment and Conbrae. The Company is the leading provider of DTH Services throughout Australia and New Zealand, offering international satellite, fibre connectivity and SNG Services across the Australasian Region.

About PanAmSat

Through its owned and operated fleet of 23 satellites, PanAmSat (NYSE:PA) is a leading global provider of video, broadcasting and network distribution and delivery services. In total, the Company's in-orbit fleet is capable of reaching over 98 percent of the world's population through cable television systems, broadcast affiliates, direct-to-home operators, Internet service providers and telecommunications companies. In addition, PanAmSat supports the largest concentration of satellite-based business networks in the U.S., as well as specialized communications services in remote areas throughout the world. For more information, visit the Company's web site at http://www.panamsat.com/.

Source: PanAmSat

CONTACT: Kathryn Lancioni of PanAmSat, +1-203-210-8649

Web site: http://www.panamsat.com/

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