News Broadcasting
Jiaxing SARFT selects Irdeto PIsys for its digital TV operation
MUMBAI: Irdeto Access, a world leader in content security, today announced that Jiaxing Broadcasting and TV Network (Jiaxing SARFT) have selected Irdeto Access’ Conditional Access (CA) solution – Irdeto PIsys – for its digital TV operation.
The license agreement reaffirms the leadership of Irdeto Access in supporting the Chinese government’s ambitious initiative to digitalise television in the world’s most populous nation.
Jiaxing is a city in the province of Zhejiang with over three million inhabitants, of which 600,000 are cable television (CATV) subscribers. Jiaxing SARFT, the local administrative authority of TV operations, manages the CATV transmission network that covers the city and all 97 counties in the surrounding suburban areas. As one of the 41 cities appointed for digital TV trials, Jiaxing SARFT plans to complete its digitalisation before 2008.
Once the project is completed, Jiaxing SARFT will be able to add over 50 new CATV channels, including about 30 channels from other provinces, approximately 20 pay-TV channels and a number of interactive TV programs.
Irdeto PIsys for Digital TV, developed for large-scale operations, will serve as a reliable platform to protect the valuable new pay-TV content and the revenues it will generate. Irdeto PIsys for Digital TV will also offer Jiaxing SARFT a wide variety of customer revenue models, from traditional subscriptions to Impulse Pay Per View, Pay Per Time, and new pre-paid scratch card-based services.
“Irdeto Access was selected for its technological excellence, its strong capability in local support and track record in delivering solutions that best meet the customers’ needs. Working with Irdeto Access enabled us to leverage their extensive experience in the pay-media industry gained over nearly four decades, to achieve our own business goals,” said Jiaxing Broadcasting and TV Network general manager Xu Guang Fu.
“Irdeto Access is a leading provider of content protection solutions for broadcast, broadband and mobile environments that offer operators the highest level of security and scalability. Part of our customer service strategy is to provide local support and to speak the local language. We are pleased to see that our strengths have been widely recognised in China,” said Irdeto Access China CEO David Xiong.
Apart from the usual 24/7 technical support, Irdeto Access also offers the following services: on site customer training, support in set top box selection as well as a thorough testing of the CA functionality and overall quality of the set top boxes during our design verification testing. The company also provides consultancy to operators on how to set up a sound security management programme in cooperation with partners, and on how to create additional content revenue streams.
News Broadcasting
News TV viewership jumps 33 per cent as West Asia war draws audiences
BARC Week 8 data shows news share rising to 8 per cent despite T20 World Cup
NEW DELHI:Â Even as individual television news channel ratings remain under a temporary pause, the genre itself is seeing a clear surge in audience attention.
According to the latest data from Broadcast Audience Research Council India, television news recorded a 33 per cent jump in genre share in Week 8 of 2026, covering February 28 to March 6.
The news genre accounted for 8 per cent of total television viewership during the week, up from 6 per cent the previous week. The spike in attention coincided with escalating geopolitical tensions involving the United States, Israel and Iran, which have kept global headlines firmly fixed on West Asia.
The rise is notable because it came at a time when cricket was dominating television screens. The high-stakes stages of the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup, including the Super 8 fixtures and semi-finals, were being broadcast during the same period.
Despite the cricket frenzy, viewers appeared to be toggling between sport and global affairs, boosting the overall share of news programming.
The surge in genre share comes even as the government has enforced a one-month pause on publishing ratings for individual news channels. The move followed regulatory scrutiny of the television ratings ecosystem.
While channel-level rankings remain temporarily out of sight, the genre-level data suggests that when global tensions escalate, audiences continue to turn to television news for real-time updates.
