British Satellite Broadcasting

British Satellite Broadcasting ( BSB ) was a company that was founded in the late 1980s to enable the direct satellite reception in the UK. It was in this segment in competition with Sky Television.

History

The British Satellite Broadcasting consortium was founded in 1986 by Granada, Pearson, Virgin and Amstrad. At the beginning of 1988, three television stations by the Independent Broadcasting Authorithy (IBA ) were licensed. The final five television channels The Movie Channel, The Sports Channel, Galaxy, The Power Station and Now but were only in March 1990, over a year after the start of the television stations to the competitor Sky Television, started and the Marco Polo satellites Marco Polo 1 and Marco Polo 2 common. But we sat, as opposed to Sky Television, the then novel partially digital transmission standard D-MAC as a broadcast standard.

Due to the fierce competitive struggle with Sky Television and the use of the new television standard D-MAC on the UK allocated BSS frequencies at which award the expensive technology of Direct Broadcasting Satellite was linked, BOD suffered by 1990 massive losses. BSB finally merged in November 1990 with its competitors Sky Television into the present company British Sky Broadcasting ( BSkyB). The five TV stations were initially taken - The Movie Channel was especially until 1997 and was then renamed Sky Movies 2; from The Sports Channel became Sky Sports with its offshoots. The BOD shareholders Granada, Pearson and Chargeuse received shares in BSkyB holding company, sold their shares but during the 1990s.