DIRECTV: Bringing a Whole New Entertainment Experience Date:   Thursday , October 01, 2009 Recession is really not a time to spend $20 to drive to the movies, another $20 for tickets, and $15 for coke and some popcorn. Even though there are a lot of players on the field, what sets DIRECTV apart is its focus on reaching out to the growing South Asian community in the U.S. through its HindiDirect packages. This HindiDirect package has created a buzz due to the quality of its channel lineup. The experience of viewing Indian channels like Star One, Star Plus, Star News, NDTV 24x7 (English News), NDTV Profit (Business News), NDTV Good Times (Lifestyle Channel), UTV Movies, Cricket Plus, and Aastha is redefined through its quality service for S29.99. Other offerings on DIRECTV include: Filmy, Star Vijay, ETV Bangla, ETV Telugu, and PTC Punjabi. Celebrating 15 years of America’s Satellite TV Service, DIRECTV is fulfilling the demands of its subscribers with new launches. It continues to grow its international programming platform with exclusive addition of PTC Punjabi, a channel fully dedicated to the lifestyle of the Punjabi community in the U.S. PTC Punjabi is a South Asian channel tailored to the preservation of the soul, culture, and heritage of Punjab, 24 hours-a-day, seven days-a-week. The channel combines high quality programming from PTC Network. PTC Punjabi delivers a variety of daytime and evening entertainment, including Gurbani (prayer) from Sri Hazoor Sahib (Nanded) every morning and news from Punjab and the Punjabi community all over the world. Apart from that, it also broadcasts talk shows, current events, family drama, live musical shows, Bollywood news, educational, and children’s programs. It has created such an impact among its consumers that for them right now it doesn’t make a difference if you’re in India or the U.S. as DIRECTV is able to deliver all Indian business and entertainment channels including the regional language channels. It has bagged exclusive broadcast rights in the United States to many cricket events including IPL, ICC Twenty20, World Cup, and Champions League match for the first time. The ICC World Twenty20 match broadcast in HD has helped them create a stickiness among their customers. Currently, it has hooked the tag as an all digital platform provider to deliver an interactive on-screen program guide and pay per view ordering services via remote control. It is also delivering a new TV experience, that is not possible with Dish Network or cable, through what is called TV Apps. Just press the right arrow on your remote and you’ll see a menu of interactive apps, like Flickr, ScoreGuide, and 5-Day Weather Forecast that gives you everything from pictures to sports scores to your local weather. It doesn’t matter what channel you’re on - the apps appear along the right side of your screen while your show continues to play, so you won’t miss a second of what you’re watching. The user can add the apps that he needs, using his TV screen or from the online DIRECTV App Store. Once added, these apps are available instantly. To enjoy TV Apps, the consumer needs a DIRECTV Plus HD DVR receiver (model HR20 and up), a DIRECTV Plus DVR (model R22), or a DIRECTV HD receiver (models H21 and H23), which must be connected to the Internet. Moreover, with the DVR scheduler, the users can record the shows which they don’t want to miss out when they are not at home. The feature will let the user schedule recordings from any computer or mobile phone as well. In fact, this continued innovation has witnessed them adding over one million new customers from July 2008 through June 2009 alone, and the trend is skyrocketing as the company claims that every eight seconds another new customer joins the DIRECTV revolution. Unlike the other service providers, DIRECTV is providing over 130 full-time HD channels and will soon be delivering over 200 channels.