Fox International Channels (FIC), a 21st Century Fox company, is buying Setanta Africa, the broadcaster whose television channel bouquet takes football, rugby, martial arts and other sports to a million homes in sub-Saharan Africa.

The acquisition is subject to approval by the Irish Competition Authority. Setanta is an international sports broadcaster based in Dublin, Ireland. It was formed in 1990, initially to facilitate the broadcasting of Irish sporting events. The company now operates in Ireland, Northern Ireland, Asia, Africa, and Australia.

Comtech Telecommunications Corp.'s fourth-quarter earnings fell 35 percent after posting sales declines throughout its operations, most notably in its mobile data communications segment. Comtech said net sales dropped to $84.4 million for the fourth quarter and $319.8 million for full year of fiscal 2013 ended July 31, 2013, compared to $112.8 million and $425.1 million for the same periods in fiscal 2012.

Netgem announced consolidated revenues of €24.1 million (US$32.84 million) for the third quarter of 2013 taking its nine-month consolidated revenue to €57.9 million (US$78.9 million).

Netgem said sales of the new T-Box in Australia and client subscriber growth in Europe and Latin America increased its international business by 75 percent as French revenues continued to slip during the quarter ending September 30, 2013.

The ability to deliver high quality, high definition video streams across home area networks to devices using multiple formats and multiple screen sizes is crucial to the success of content and service providers. Pay-TV providers, particularly cable providers looking to avoid becoming simply a "dumb" pipe, are increasingly implementing plans to provide content to consumers via multiple types of devices within and outside of the home, according to MRG.

United Kingdom’s Office of Fair Trading has referred the acquisition by Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson of Red Bee Media Limited to the Competition Commission (CC).

OFT, which is mandated to make sure businesses are in open, fair and vigorous competition in order to protect consumers, said it found that the merger might lead to an increase in prices or a worsening of service levels in the supply of linear playout services in the UK.

ORBCOMM Inc., a provider of Machine-to-Machine (M2M) solutions, today announced that it has completed the acquisition of Comtech Mobile Datacom Corporation’s (Comtech) Sensor Enabled Notification System (SENS) operation, which includes satellite hardware, network technology and web platforms. SENS is a market leader in providing one-way satellite products and services to more than 20,000 subscribers worldwide.

Globecast announced that it has added Japanese content to its MyGlobeTV platform in the United States. Toei Japan Channel and Fishing Vision have chosen this platform for their launch in the United States market.

MyGlobeTV is a consumer television service available in the United States that brings international and genre-based audiovisual content directly to subscribers via broadband. The fastest growing source of international content in the United States, MyGlobeTV delivers premium programming from around the globe to television or any connected device.

Sydney-based Macquarie Group Limited ,  a global investment banking and diversified financial services company, is reported to be auctioning off its 25 percent stake in Arqiva, a telecommunications company that provides infrastructure and broadcast transmission facilities in the United Kingdom and Ireland. 

Macquairie, according to Financial Times, is anticipating GBP 600 million (US$971.17 million) for the stake.

The Satellite Interference Reduction Group (IRG) will be tackling a number of important issues at its annual conference, which this year takes place in Rio de Janeiro from 16th - 18th October and is being sponsored by Intelsat, Kratos, Newtec, and SatMex.
 

Vivendi and EchoStar Corp. announced today that EchoStar Technologies LLC and Vivendi subsidiary GVT have entered into negotiations to form a joint venture for pay TV services in Brazil.