20 March 2007

Ofcom to investigate pay-television market

At the request of BT [Vision], Top Up TV, Setanta Sports and Virgin Media, media regulator Ofcom is to launch an investigation into the UK pay-television market. In other words, they will investigate the dominance of Sky and whether they should be referred to the Competition Commission. Despite not yet having received an application, Ofcom will also pre-empt Sky's "plan" to launch a pay service on DTT by investigating the effect it would have on the marketplace. Sky have responded in a typically-childish manner, claiming "BT, Top Up TV and Setanta all have a commercial interest in preventing Sky from increasing customer choice by developing a new pay-TV service on DTT".