DSTv Running Scared of Gateway

The reality of formidable competition in the local satellite TV market is here with us. In a full page advert, Gateway TV cheekily declared the “right” to entertainment for African televison sets in “The TV Bill of Rights”. Also in the Gateway advertising arsenal is a mix of radio commercials and outdoor billboards. The new service slated for a simultaneous East African launch on 29^th June has got the eleven year old Multichoice Kenya’s DSTv running scared.

The recently introduced a third product for the Kenyan market called the DSTv Family package, obviously in response to the planned entrance, Gateway. Some time last year DSTv had introduced the Compact package of 24 channels for 25 dollars that compared favourably with the flagship product of 43 dollars offering over 50 channels to Kenyans.

GTv have been quoted in the media promising about 20 channels including the all time Kenyan favourite TV product in the name of English Premier League that runs between August and May every year. They wish to price their product at about 20 dollars aiming to capture the 35 million strong middle class of the East African region.

My grouse with DSTv is the fact that they have acted as a true monopoly in this market. For instance the Compact package with more premium channels is priced at about 990 shillings in South Africa. Even their Premium Bouquet is priced at over 40% cheaper in Tanzania. What is it with our market that gets every vendor on an exploitative mode? Is it our taxation regime? Is it the cost of doing business here? Whatever the explanation, I don’t think it will make sense to me.

In any case, the Family Package is really a waste of time because the channels offered may not be satisfactory to any of the following viewers:-

The sports buff who can only view Supersport 4 , which gives you ten minutes updates of events that are shown live on the other Super sport channels. Supersport Select is not any different from the Club programming that is on citizen TV lately- showing lots of not-so memorable matches from the past.

The Movie Fan is left out of Family Package, which has no dedicated movies’ channel apart from Action X and Africa Magic. The former is aired at ungodly hours while the latter is a 24hours West African badly produced movies channel. At least the Compact had the Hallmark Channel with its “soft” themed old movies on offer.

For the kids, there is Boomerang, which shows old cartoons as opposed to the ones most young kids are familiar with on Carton Network as seen on, free to air channels.

The Reality buff is only given Reality Zone and National Geographic and denied Animal Planet, Discovery and History Channel from the main bouquet.

For News fans, I think it’s an insult to be given BBC and Al Jazeera, which already proliferate the free channels. At least an addition of either Sky TV or CNN would have made sense.

Music buffs are also snubbed because Channel O is already available for more that 8 hours on free channels. It is especially insulting when you know that they don’t think you worthy of say MTV, MTV Base or Trace. As for the DMX Music channels, I don’t know of anyone who use their TVs to listen to music or radio!

The other 12 of the 20 channels are really not of any use to the average Kenyan “Family”. Who wants to watch the French TV5Monde, Portuguese RTP International, Chinese CCTV in French or the Italian Rai International? Supersport Active and PlayJam are interactive channels that keep you informed on offerings in the other Supersport Channels (that you don’t have) and interactive computer games for kids respectively. Rhema is a Sunday only Christian channel. CNBC is a business specialist channels that can hardly be recommended “family” viewing nor is Mindset learn that is a channels dedicated to teaching South African children math and sciences.

Whereas I have nothing against market segmentation based on needs and ability to pay, I think it is wrong to hoodwink consumers into paying 19 dollars a month for 8 average channels and another 12 useless channels. That is not acceptable for a Nairobi viewer who is already getting 9 free channels, all almost for 24 hours. DSTv has exploited the prestige that satellite TV is associated with to take advantage of their monopolistic position in the market to rake in abnormal profits by over pricing their products.

I am sure Multichoice Kenya could have increased their subscribers tenfold if they had priced their products as follows:- many so called middle class Kenyans would have no problem paying 11 dollars for DSTv Family or 15 dollars for DSTv Compact with the additional Supersport 3 and one more MovieMagic channel. The DSTv Bouquet can continue to be charged at 43 dollars and you can load onto it all the music, radio, gaming, and foreign language, alternative lifestyle channels that you wish. I am sure there are Kenyans out there who have the time and inclination to watch all those channels.

I have been a consumer of DSTv for a while now, mainly due to my love for cricket and documentaries and pressure from my children. I have an arrangement with the kids, of upgrading to the full Premium Bouquet over the April, August and December holidays and the Compact over the rest of the months. The last one month, I declined to renew the subscription because no one seems to watch it during these periods. The kids are caught in the homework web on weekdays; the parents get home late on almost all weekdays. The weekends are errand time, visiting time and generally entertaining visitors. The kids have to clear weekend homework and still find time to play with their neighbourhood’s pals. So why should I continue paying 25 dollars to keep the house help entertained with Nigerian movies?

I am waiting for Gateway TV to change my thinking soon.