News

UK company to use broadband satellite at music kiosks

March 12, 2003

GERMANTOWN, Md. -- Hughes Network Systems Europe (HNSE), Europe's leading provider of broadband satellite solutions, has signed a multi-year contract with Virtual Music Stores (VMS) to provide DIRECWAY broadband satellite services.

According to a news release, VMS will utilize DIRECWAY to distribute music content to its "On Demand" manufacturing kiosks in retail stores across Europe.

At the kiosks, customers can listen to a library of music, including video samples, and select either chart compact discs (CDs) with original artwork or create their own CDs from individual tracks. Custom CDs are made on demand within minutes.

Each CD is coded with a UPC label and individually priced, based on negotiations between the individual retailers and their music supply companies, and executed on a store-by-store basis.

Broadband, two-way satellite terminals from HNSE will provide an "always on" link to the DIRECWAY Network Management Centre (NMC), where the music library is stored and from where selections can be transmitted to any location.

According to the release, DIRECWAY utilizes transmission algorithms to simultaneously multicast to many locations, or to unicast selectively, allowing stores to be individually customized. Point-of-sale transaction data, including credit verification and payment, also is transmitted back from each store via the two-way satellite terminal, providing a secure and auditable royalty payment record for the copyright owners.

Adam Turner, managing director of VMS, said in the release, "DIRECWAY's unique compression, encryption and bandwidth management qualities make it the ideal solution, providing us with a strong satellite broadband platform for VMS' digital distribution service as well as enabling us to expedite our global roll-out initiatives."

VMS has conducted trials of its offering in the UK over the past two years with music retailers WH Smith, Sainsburys and Tesco. According to the release, it is negotiating contracts with all the key music supply companies.

Bernhard Baer, Vice President for Sales and Marketing at Hughes Network Systems Europe, said in the release, "We are pleased to see our broadband solutions being utilized to support such an innovative business."