Moldovan Media - Television

Television

Television industry in Moldova begun in 1956 with the construction of the country's first dedicated television tower in Chişinău which took a little over a year to complete, the finished tower was 196 meters tall and could broadcast within a 60 km radius. The first television transmission was sent on 30 April 1958 at 19:00 and included amongst other things cheers from all the parties that participated in the project's development as well as some local celebrities.
At first programs were broadcast only two times a week on Friday and Sunday but by the end of 1958 broadcasts became daily. The first live broadcast in the country also happened in 1958.
In 1961 the coverage area was expanded after several relay masts were constructed in Bălţi, Cahul and Comrat. Since 1974 all broadcasts were made in color and in 1977 the first dedicated television studio was built which is still in use to this day. In the early 80's there were more than a million citizens with access to television sets. During the Soviet era there weren't all that many channels available with most of them being news and general purpose channels which were all state owned. The industry didn't really change much and only after the fall of the USSR was when the television industry in the country really started to gain momentum. One of the first cable companies to begin their operation in the country was EuroCable which began its operation shortly after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the company offered cable television to its customers with multiple local and foreign channels. EuroCable remained the dominant cable television provider until in the mid 90's it was bought by SunCommunications which merged it with its own service and re-branded it into SunTV. Because EuroCable and later SunTV began very early they gathered a large subscription base and remain the dominant cable television provider to this day offering their services in several large towns in the country. During 2000's many other Chişinău based cable television providers such as Satellit, Delta and Alfa emerged offering similar services as SunTV, as of 2011 there are 118 registered television providers. In 2007 Arax Communications launched its own cable television network called Zebra TV which became the first digital network in the country, SunTV followed launching its own digital network later that year. Until recently accessing television was only possible via cable but in 2011 StarNet and Moldtelecom launched their separate IPTV services in Chişinău and other towns offering multiple channels on both SD and HD qualities. Local broadcasting has remained fairly undeveloped since the time it was first launched although progress towards better quality is quite rapid with most local channels hoping to go digital by 2015.

Usage statistics and subscription base (2011)

• Number of Cable subscriptions - 210,500
• Number of IPTV subscriptions - 35,100
• Number of DTH subscriptions - 6,200
• Number of MMDS subscriptions - 3,500
• Total number of subscriptions - 255,400 est.

Market Structure by Number of Users. (2011)

• SunCommunications - 49.04%
• Moldtelecom - 22.49%
• AMT - 4.7%
• Alfa - 2.55%
• Rest - 21.22%