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Italian teleport for Padua

By Staff Writer | October 24, 2001

      Italy’s Netdish, Fracarro Radioindustrie and Network Teleport Italia (NTI) have announced that the first satellite teleport in Northeast part of the country will become operational this December. Based in Padua, it will be configured as an open infrastructure physically linked to a large number of terrestrial operators (ISPs, telecom operators and broadcasters) that need to boost the geographical coverage of their services.

      By exploiting the advantages and potential of satellite transmissions, the teleport will offer value-added services such as the bi-directional last mile, IP broadband content distribution and transmission of radio and television stations. The choice of setting up the teleport in Padua has been dictated by the need to serve emerging telecom markets in Eastern Europe and the Mediterranean basin.

      The Padua teleport will form part of a satellite network infrastructure in North Italy being set up by NTI that already includes similar facilities in Genoa and Milan. The former, which became operational last month, is already being used for the transmission of TV channels broadcast by Hot Bird at 13 degrees East, as well as for the reception and redistribution of foreign transmissions. Capacity has already been booked on Eutelsat’s Hot Bird, W3 and Eurobird satellites, while negotiations are currently taking place with other operators such as PanAmSat, NSS and Euro*Star in order to ensure global coverage. The Milan teleport is meanwhile being principally used as a digital platform for radio and television broadcasters, as well as for broadband Internet connectivity.

      Investments in the NTI teleport network are projected to reach E20 million over the next five years, and the company also expects to find new financial and technological partners for both single teleports and the holding by next year. Following the completion of the first phase of the Padua teleport, NTI plans to develop other nodes in central and southern Italy in 2002 and 2003. Its shareholders are currently Network Satellite Italia (a supplier of integral telecom solutions), Fortress Italia (a satellite hardware supplier) and Numidia (content asset management).