Eutelsat launches Europe’s first dedicated 4K channel

Eutelsat  has announced the launch of a dedicated demonstration Ultra HD channel for Europe on the Eutelsat 10A satellite, with the first transmissions of content filmed in 4K starting this week.

Delivering a resolution of eight million pixels, four times the resolution of HDTV, Ultra HD (4K) is poised to mark the next big leap forward in the immersive viewing experience, Broadband TV reports.

Eutelsat’s new channel is designed for those who want to acquire expertise in 4K, including production companies, pay-TV operators, rights owners and TV set manufacturers. The new channel will operate in progressive mode at 50 frames per second. It will be encoded in MPEG-4 and transmitted at 40 Mbit/s in four Quad HD streams.

Eutelsat is partnering with ATEME, a video compression solution provider to the broadcast industry, for the transmissions that will be uplinked to the Eutelsat 10A satellite from its teleport in Rambouillet, near Paris.

“This new step towards 4K continues Eutelsat’s longstanding commitment to achieving new broadcast milestones that over the last 20 years have included digital TV, HDTV and 3D,” said Jean-François Leprince-Ringuet, Eutelsat’s commercial director, in a statement.

“Early and close collaboration between all players in the broadcast chain will be a key success factor for this new revolution and so we are delighted to propose this first broadcast platform for Europe.”