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Gidabyte's Exclusive Interview with Mr. Peter Jackson, CEO of AsiaSat [25.01.07]

Andrey Gidaspov: AsiaSat is a leading satellite operator in Asia Pacific.  What are the cornerstones of your business strategy? How do you cope with the ups and downs in the satellite sector? What is your current technical capacity?

Peter Jackson:  Our business strategy has always been based on providing wide coverage, high power, satellite capacity that is well coordinated, so that our customers enjoy minimal, if any, adjacent satellite interference. The satellite market has recently been flat but very competitive. When the market revives, we need to be responsive and adjust quickly to capture the opportunities as they arise from the increased demand. We need to capitalise on our reputation for providing high quality services and continue to differentiate ourselves from our competitors by providing even higher service quality and more diverse services that meet our customers’ needs. 

We currently own a fleet of three satellites offering very powerful Asian coverage. We shall continue to focus on our core business of transponder capacity leasing but at the time diversify our business into areas that help improve our satellite utilisation and add value to the core satellite business through joint ventures and subsidiary companies. This would help us diversify our service offerings and expand revenue streams.

AG: Please share with our readers the results of AsiaSat activities in year 2006. Perhaps, you could share a success story or an interesting project.

PJ: We cannot give you our full year 2006 results yet but for the 1^st half we managed to raise our satellites’ overall utilisation despite overcapacity in many Asian markets. We also managed to renew a number of large contracts with existing customers and signed up a number of new customers in new markets for example some new broadcast customers from Brunei, Afghanistan and Russia.

Last year we also announced the commissioning of a new satellite project AsiaSat 5, this is an important milestone for us as the new satellite will replace one of our existing satellites AsiaSat 2 to ensure uninterrupted service to our existing customers. Technically this new satellite will give us improved power and coverage and more capacity for satellite service, and to give us the capability to offer the right kind of capacity that meet the future market needs.  

AG: What are your plans for the Russian market?  

PJ: The Russian economy has been growing in the last decade in a prosperous manner, thanks to the richness in resources in Russia and to effective government policies amongst other factors. Demand for television entertainment, and broadband Internet from both the corporate and residential sectors, is constantly on the rise.

The satellite market although well served by Russian operators constantly experiences shortage in supply, in particular the capacity serving markets outside Russia. AsiaSat satellites provide region wide C-band coverage across 53 countries spanning from Russia to New Zealand and from Japan to the Middle East and parts of Africa. They are ideal for serving broadcast and telecom industries in Russia for both national and overseas services.

Our satellite AsiaSat 2 is already broadcasting Russian state owned channel RTR Planeta offering Russian speaking viewers in Asia and Australasia prime time news, sports, feature films, documentary movies and general cultural programming. Some other Russian channels are also using our AsiaSat 4 satellite for DTH television service in Australia. 

We see the demand from Russian broadcasters for overseas broadcasting is increasing and we are looking at further expanding our services to these markets in the near future. 

AG: Are you interested in finding a partner/opening a representative office?  

PJ: Yes. Because of obvious reasons such as language, distance, market understanding and connection, cultural needs, etc., we do have partners and agents in various countries today working with AsiaSat.  At this stage, we are looking at various options including working with a partner or agent in Russia that would help us to further understand the market, develop our business and strengthen our customer base in Russia.

AG: How do you see your business in Russia? 

PJ: Russia although with its ever-growing demand for satellite use does present challenges. Capacity is generally competitively priced based on end-user driven pricing. The fibre infrastructure is also developing fast. There are incumbent foreign satellite operators who have long established.

As a result, we have to understand where we can fit in. We see opportunities in broadcasting more Russian channels for Russia and to the rest of Asia, as well as serving telecommunication applications for the large domestic operators.

AG: How much of the AsiaSat's success depends on marketing and advertisement? Please provide an example of a successful marketing campaign.

PJ: I think our success is built on our long track record of excellence in quality and service. We have over the 16 years of operation established a strong reputation of market leadership. Successful marketing relies on how we understand ourselves as well as our markets. Instead of extensive advertisement, we prefer to do marketing on the ground and to have a 2 way channel with our potential customers.  

AG: With the global satellite industry gradually returning back to the norm, what is your view on its development trends in the next 5 years.

PJ: Due to overcapacity situation in Asia, the Asian satellite market has been flat over the past few years. However, we see revived demands for satellite capacity for new applications such as video to mobile and HDTV, thus improving the satellite market as a whole. I think excessive capacity will gradually be filled up and supply will tighten, that helps to improve the transponder pricing.