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SINGAPORE: StarHub is raising the ante in the pay TV war – it is rearranging its pricing plans, with new offerings and "upsized" options for its basic groups from May 30.
Customers can now add up to 14 additional channels through a new Basic Upsize tier for an extra S$5.35 per month. There is also a new basic group of lifestyle channels, bringing the total number of basic groups to seven.
Krishna Baidya, senior industry analyst, Frost & Sullivan, said: "The main goal, I feel, is that they're trying to tell the customers that they're giving better value for the money they spend.
"But the reason why StarHub could be doing this at this point of time is definitely because they are anticipating more competition from SingTel's mio TV."
StarHub's new offering comes after recent moves by SingTel to raise its mio TV profile. SingTel recently launched mio TV on Mobile and it won exclusive rights to air the UEFA Champions League.
For now, StarHub and SingTel are clearly fighting it out on the content front, rather than in the area of pricing.
Patrick Lim, Head of Cable TV Services, StarHub, said: "Content is an important cost and we'll try to make it as affordable to customers. Really, it's a correlation of how much the cost of the content is."
According to industry watchers, premium channels continue to drive up the cost of pay TV. Despite the growing competition, they said customers are unlikely to pay less anytime soon.
"At the end of the day, when it comes to pay TV services, the end consumer is not really keen on knowing what platform or what sort of technology you're using, but what they're really keen on knowing is what content they're getting," said Krishna.
Currently, StarHub offers 157 channels. By July, this will increase to 159 with the addition of Sci-Fi and Universal channels.
- CNA/so
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