New SKY offer from Vodafone

Vodafone is offering a bonus deal to SKY customers, enabling them to upgrade to the MYSKYHDi service.

SKY customers who have their landline and broadband with Vodafone (Ideal or Ultimate packages) will be offered MYSKYHDi at no cost.

MYSKYHDi is a digital video recorder with an electronic programming guide.

SKY Television CEO John Fellet calls the move “a natural progression in our relationship with Vodafone for them to bill and bundle SKY services”.

The offer will be available from December 7th, and those who take it up are entitled to the MYSKYHDi discount for as long as they have their SKY services and the previously mentioned Vodafone packages. A special discounted installation rate of $49 will apply.

More information is at www.vodafone.co.nz/sky-tv/mysky.jsp

Some journalists attending today’s media briefing had been expecting an announcement concerning SKY’s online presence, in the wake of the launch of TiVo, which is bundled with Telecom.

Asked whether there were any plans to allow downloading of content without encroaching on the user’s data cap (as available through TiVo), Vodafone CEO Russell Stanners was non-committal, saying only that Vodafone was “open to possibilities in that area”. He said today’s announcement was a “deepening of the relationship” between Vodafone and SKY.

Fellet said there were “four or five other issues that we hope to get you back into this room for sometime in the future”.

Asked about TiVo, Fellet said SKY’s existing offerings (pay-per-view and high-definition movies) were “broader content” than what is currently being offered by TiVo.

SKY’s online service was taken down earlier this year to revamp the business model, but developments in this area remain under wraps.

“We’re not the Internet experts, so we’ll wait till that market clears and take advice from Vodafone as to the best time to look at that,” Fellet commented.