Cambodia’s digital pay TV provider celebrates first birthday

Cambodia’s first digital pay television provider, One TV, is celebrating its first anniversary.

Launched on 15 September 2012 in Phnom Penh as a partnership between the Russian GS Group and local Cambodian Royal Group of Companies, the network now covers nine provinces and provides 80 channels of content to subscribers.

Sergey Dolgopolsky, Director of Foreign Projects for the GS Group, says that within one year One TV managed to extend its coverage to reach 70% of the country.

“Today the operator is the only pay-TV operator on a national scale,” he says. “One TV has made real a breakthrough in TV broadcasting in the country, bringing quality TV to Cambodian homes and coming ahead of the officially planned digital TV switchover.

“Furthermore, the operator has widely enriched the content in one year by listening for viewing preferences of the local population.”

At the launch in 2012, 20 channels were available in DVB-T standard and now there are 80, including local content, popular Asian channels and international networks. The operator says it has also focused on starting production of its own unique Khmer content.

GS Group’s Polina Belova says the Cambodian project became a success because they managed to find a local partner with similar interests in the market.

“We happened to have the same goals, and we quickly came to an agreement,” she says. “Preparations for the launch of the first national digital operator took only six months, that is a record-breaking time for a project of this level”.

Mr Dolgopolsky says the venture created more than 130 jobs for local specialists, with training and education programs arranged for them.