Arena signs up producers for Bundesliga soccer

As was announced on Monday, Arena has signed EM-TV subsidiary Plazamedia as producer for the German Soccer League for three years. Plazamedia claims to be the largest German sports TV producer. Arena is also negotiating with Technisat and SES Astra for the transmission of Bundesliga matches on satellite TV from the coming season. Unlike Astra, Technisat uses a technology that is not compatible with Premiere decoders. The cooperation with the decoder manufacturer Technisat would have the advantage for Arena of avoiding high license payments for the use of Premiere decoders. For television viewers, however, it would have the disadvantage that they would need a new television decoder in order to receive the Bundesliga. As the industry magazine Werben & Verkaufen reports, the pay-TV channel Premiere, which has lost the Bundeliga rights to Arena, has launched a large-scale image campaign to appeal to users emotionally and build loyalty. The image campaign will run until the end of March and will be followed by a product offensive in mid-April.