DSO To Provide N100b Boost For Nollywood Distribution Network – Minister

The Digital Switch Over (DSO) in Broadcasting is set to create a N100
billion Naira per annum FreeTV distribution network for Nollywood,
among a number of positive spin-offs, the Minister of Information and
Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, said on Thursday.

Speaking at the launch of the DSO in Abuja, the Minister also listed
job creation, 30 free digital channels, free and easy access to
Government and Public information through a touch of the remote
control, current affairs and news available through the middleware on
the boxes and a world class Electronic Programme Guide that will make
television viewing an unbeatable experience

”We have watched our beloved Nollywood move from VHS tapes to VCD to
DVD, and whereas the whole world has moved to digital consumption
of content with its attendant benefits and democratisation of distribution,
we have been constrained by limited penetration of Internet in our homes.

”With the middleware in our Set-top boxes/Receiving equipment, homes
will be able to buy and watch the latest Nollywood movies without the
need for Internet. Imagine a film released on Monday morning being
immediately available to 24 million plus households at the touch of a
button,”
he said

In his speech entitled ”The Best of Television For All Nigerians,”
Alhaji Mohammed said the local manufacture of Set-top boxes, which has
already begun, is already extending to local Smart TV and Tablet
manufacturing, thus creating jobs.

”With our strong consumer base, we can quickly become the supplier of
these equipment to the whole of West Africa. As we speak, jobs are
already being created as we engage Engineers, Technicians, Retailers,
Distributors and Marketers, among others,” he said.

The Minister said the Electronic Program Guide will also be a platform
for Application (App) developers to create products that will make
life easier for the home consumers, thereby creating and promoting an
industry of developers that will operate in both the Television and Telecoms
industries.

In addition, he said, the increase in Free-To- Air channels and the
separation of transmission from content aggregation will spur an
increase in TV production activities, as the channels will now be able
to focus on
their TV shows and harness the variety of human and creative skills to
compete to become the most watched channel.

Alhaji Mohammed said the DSO would also help to grow the TV
advertising market by $400 million per annum through audience
measurement, adding: ”Our digital environment will give equal opportunity to
everyone to be rewarded for investment in creativity, and that is what
the regime of forensic Audience Measurement, which Digitisation
offers, will afford.
If it is your programme people are watching, you will be the recipient
of higher revenues because the advertisers will run to you.”

He reiterated the government’s unwavering commitment to meeting the
deadline of June 2017 for the analogue to digital switch over in
Nigeria and other West African countries, as set by the International
Telecommunications Union (ITU).

The Minister commended Pinnacle Communications, the signal distributor
for the Abuja DSO, for its massive investment that heralded the
success of the launch, as well as the National Broadcasting Commission,
Digiteam, content aggregators CCNL, software provider Inview,
Broadcasting Organisation of Nigeria and RATTAWU.

The Pilot Scheme of the DSO was launched in Jos, Plateau State, on 30
April 2016, after two previous failures – in 2012 and 2015.

President Muhammadu Buhari, who was represented by Vice President Yemi
Osinbajo, commissioned the Abuja DSO at the offices of Pinnacle
Communications Ltd.

The President said the Federal Government is ”irreversibly
committed” to meeting
the June 2017 deadline for the switch over and congratulated the Minister of
Information, the Director General of NBC, Pinnacle Communications and
Set-top box
manufacturers SMK ”for a world class performance on this switch over”.