Also in the offing are providing equipment and support to set up gateways for private internet service providers. The company has already sold over 10,000 digital decoders (also known as satellite signal receivers) in the country in the last six months, said Scientific Atalanta country manager Manoj Chugh. He expects the demand to rise many folds in the coming months with more and more channels going digital.

To consolidate its digital decoder business, Scientific Atlanta is in the process of appointing authorised service partners across the country. In the fray are companies such as Punwire, Cnet and Blue Star, among others. The company is also sourcing skilled manpowerfrom the country for servicing projects in Europe.

Scientific Atlanta is in talks with several Indian broadcasters for putting in place video uplinking facilities and gateways. For facilitating broadcasters to set up uplinking gateways, the company plans to work closely with system integrators.

Scientific Atlanta has been a major source of analog and digital broadband equipment for cable television industry in the country. The company has a manufacturing arrangement with Punjab Wireless Systems Ltd for making broadband equipment.

Despite being bullish on the media business, Scientific Atlanta will be more aggressively marketing its VSAT technology in India, said Chugh. At present, the company has over 75 customers using its VSATs.

The installed base of Scientific Atlanta VSATs has increased from 100 in 1997 to 500 by end of 1998. The company did business worth Rs 35 crore in 1997-98. Chugh is confident of installing over 1,000 VSATs by end of this year.

Chugh expects an applications-driven growth inthe VSAT market in the country. Deficiency in telecommunication infrastructure was responsible for the initial spurt in demand for VSATs, said Chugh. In the coming years, applications and reliability of the VSAT-based systems would be major drivers of growth, he added.

For instance, worldwide over 80,000 VSATs were sold in 1998, up from 55,000 in the previous year. Of these, over 50 per cent sales were in the US which boosts of a fairly well-developed terrestrial telecom network. The Indian market too would follow a similar trend, said Chugh.

The country has about 7,000 VSAT installations. The recent cut in leased line rates will have only a marginal impact on the VSAT industry, said Chugh. However, the scarcity of transponder space can act as a significant barrier to market development efforts for VSAT service companies, he added.Scientific Atlanta presently operates from a liaison office in Delhi.