DTH
NDS, Canal Plus dispute to be heard in California court on Thursday
French tech company Canal Plus and Rupert Murdoch’s NDS will lock horns in a California court on Thursday. This will be the first public hearing of the claim in which Canal Plus is suing NDS for $ 1 billion dollars.
The controversy started last month when the French company accused NDS of cracking its pay-TV smart card software and helping create counterfeit versions by distributing the security codes on the internet. Canal Plus’s case appears to have gathered momentum as Oliver Kommerling, an employee of NDS-owned ADSR, threatens to turn whistleblower. He said in his deposition that he had a written report showing that “NDS engineers disassembled and analysed” the security software used by Canal Plus smart cards.
Kommerling said that he was told by NDS employees that the Canal Plus code was cracked by NDS technicians in Israel. He has alleged that Chris Tarnovsky, an NDS employee, arranged for the Canal Plus codes to be published on a website, www. DR7.com.
Even if the charge is validated, Canal Plus has to prove that Tarnovsky did the needful under instructions from NDS management. Rupert Murdoch’s sons, James and Lachlan, are on the NDS board. Meanwhile, NDS continues to maintain that it was in no way involved in the piracy of smart cards, used to enable Vivendi and ITV Digital pay-TV services.
DTH Operator
JC Flowers withdraws NCLT plea against Dish TV over EGM demand
Move eases pressure on DTH firm as long-running shareholder dispute cools
MUMBAI: In a breather for Dish TV India, JC Flowers Asset Reconstruction has withdrawn its petition before the National Company Law Tribunal seeking directions to convene an extraordinary general meeting.
The development was disclosed by Dish TV in a regulatory filing, confirming that the petitioner chose to withdraw the case during a hearing at the Mumbai bench of the tribunal. A detailed order from the bench is still awaited.
The petition, originally filed under Sections 98 to 100 of the Companies Act, 2013, sought to push for an extraordinary general meeting to address governance issues at the company. The case had its roots in a prolonged shareholder tussle dating back to 2021, when Yes Bank, then the largest shareholder, was at odds with the promoter group led by Subhash Chandra over board reconstitution.
JC Flowers had stepped into the picture as an assignee of Yes Bank’s stressed assets, effectively continuing the legal push initiated earlier. The withdrawal now signals a pause, if not a closure, to that chapter of dispute.
While the reasons behind the withdrawal have not been formally detailed, the move reduces immediate legal pressure on Dish TV, which has been navigating both operational and regulatory challenges in recent years.
For now, the focus shifts back to the company’s business fundamentals, even as the legal dust settles, at least temporarily, on one of its more closely watched shareholder battles.
