Subscribers in Kenya to the former GTV and Smart TV, both pay TV services, can now sigh with relief after the latest entrant into the country’s pay TV industry StarTimes media announced it is willing to upgrade their [subscribers] outdated decoders with StarTimes decoders.
However, with the stiffening competition in Kenya’s Pay TV market, StarTimes has decided to capitalise on this and will now add this number to its subscriber base in the country.
Those with the ex-GTV And Smart TV decoders will be required to visit any Smart TV outlets, present their old decoders in exchange for free StarTimes T2 decoder, on condition that they pay an upfront subscription fee to any of StartTime’s packages.
“They will only be required to present the set top boxes at StarTimes customer service centre where they will get a free StarTimes T2 decoder in return upon payment of the monthly subscription,” said Leo Lee, chief executive StarTimes.
Currently, StarTimes offers six packages namely: Basic at KSh499 (US$ 6), Classic or Indian package at Ksh999 (US$ 12); Classic + at KSh1,499 (US$ 18), Unique package at KSh1,999 (US$ 24) and Unique + package at KSh2,499 (US$ 30) per month.
Those with counterfeit or non-registered T1 decoder holders will also benefit from this initiative.
StarTimes launched its services in Kenya in June 2012, having already established its presence in East Africa since 2006 when it first launched its services in Rwanda.
The company is also present in 10 other Africa countries including Tanzania and Burundi, where it provides its wireless digital TV platform based on DVB-T2 technology.
Globally, the company has over 8 million subscribers with 1.4 million coming from Africa.
