'RCTI' and Indosat sign World Cup TV deal

I Wayan Juniartha, The Jakarta Post, Denpasar

Commercial Director of Indosat Guntur Siregar and Executive Director of the private television station RCTI Wisnu Hadi signed here on Saturday a US$110,000 cooperation contract, which would enable RCTI to transmit live broadcasts of the 2002 FIFA World Cup matches in Japan and South Korea by utilizing Indosat's TV Link digital network.

"The Indosat TV Link digital network provides a medium through which a television station is able to present in real time to its viewers in Indonesia a live event that is taking place in a different part of the world," Guntur Siregar said.

He stated that the digitized Indosat TV Link provided better audio and video quality than the analog system. The higher compression ratio of the digital system would also require less satellite bandwidth and ultimately reduce the transmission cost.

"We will work hand-in-hand with our counterparts in South Korea and Japan, Korea Telecom and KDD, to provide seamless transmission services to RCTI. Indosat also has an undersea fiber-optic cable network as a backup system in case the satellite-based network experiences any problems," Guntur Siregar said.

Separately, Wisnu Hadi stated that RCTI had prepared various World Cup-related on-air programs, such as quizzes, news, soccer team profiles, world cup history and several off-air activities to pamper its viewers during the course of the 2002 World Cup, from May 31 through June 30.

"We will allocate an average of eight hours per day for broadcasting cup matches. Four hours in the afternoon will be a live broadcast of two matches, and another four hours before dawn will be a delayed broadcast," Wisnu told.

RCTI, which spent $5 million to secure the exclusive rights to be Indonesia's official 2002 FIFA World Cup TV station, is preparing to send up to 20 reporters and cameramen to Japan and South Korea, the two countries cohosting the event.