Spain: Satellite TV, the driving force behind digital TV

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Satellite TV has become the main driving force behind the development of digital TV in Spain.

Today, 1.68 million homes receive digital television through satellite, representing 12 per cent of the 13.84 million TV households in Spain and 67.4 per cent of the 2.49 million satellite TV homes, according to a market research by SES-Astra. Over the last six years digital satellite TV has grown by 1.1 million homes.

Satellite TV is available to 18 per cent of Spanish TV households (2.49 million) and in 2003 it had a 7.2 per cent growth. By comparison, cable TV - which had the fastest growth in 2003 with a rise of 33.8 per cent- can be received in only 840,000 homes, 10.52 million homes have only terrestrial television.

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However Spain is still too far behind Europe's standards and figures. Having one single satellite digital platform (due to the merger of CSD and Via Digital) have carried more expensive packs and the users' felling that there is a lack of competition which has created the sense of having a low quality platform (Digital+), compared with those in France, Italy or UK.

DTT was not promoted by the consevative government, but the current socialist government do not seem to push it and it had.

Cable is only available in a few areas of some big cities. For them, digital television is only an added value to their internet and telephone offer.