South Korea’s Arirang TV expands relationship with Globecast to broadcast across Western Europe

Globecast, has announced that it’s expanding its relationship with South Korean TV network Arirang TV, to broadcast in HD across Western Europe.

Arirang TV, which includes coverage of sport events, is operated by the Korea International Broadcasting Foundation and is aimed at growing an international audience for Korean television. The deal with Globecast sets the broadcaster to reach approximately 26 million homes in HD across Western Europe.

Lee, Yong-Jae, distribution director at Arirang TV, commented: “We have a highly valued relationship with Globecast and we very much trust the technical expertise and the quality of services they provide. Given the strength of our relationship, it made absolute sense to expand our partnership, trusting Globecast with this next phase of our company’s growth. Platforms across Europe were eager for us to upgrade to HD, but this had to be achieved as cost-effectively as possible.”

Globecast is to handle multiple distribution services for the South Korean broadcaster, including Eutelsat Hotbird 13B in SD across all of Europe, Astra 2G for in HD for the UK, and now the new HD service.

Seechai Tan, head of sales at Globecast Asia, added: “Arirang TV had a stringent budget for expansion in the European market but they were very keen to upgrade their channel to HD to meet affiliate and viewer demand for a higher quality service. We studied the market together and came up with the best solution for them to help them shape the future development of their business.”