章 141: Chapter 141 Christmas Speech
"Christmas is the anniversary of the birth of Christ more than two thousand years ago, but it is much more than that. It is a celebration of the birth of ideas and ideals.
From another perspective, I feel that the Golden Jubilee is more than just an anniversary.
These celebrations are joyous occasions, but they also seem to evoke something more lasting and profound – a sense of belonging and pride in one's country, town or community; a sense of sharing a common heritage that is enriched by the cultural, ethnic and religious diversity of our 21st century society."
On Christmas Day, the Queen delivered her annual speech to the people of the UK via television.
It can be said that the Queen encountered many things in this year, including the deaths of her sister and mother at the beginning of the year, and then the Golden Jubilee celebrations of her 50th anniversary of accession to the throne in June.
Later, the Queen was implicated in a "theft scandal" in which the late Princess Diana's butler was involved in the sale of her personal belongings. As a result, the prestige she had gained after the Golden Jubilee celebrations was undermined.
In addition, there are many scandals within the royal family that have been reported in the newspapers.
For this reason, there are rumors that he is preparing to "abdicate".
Her speech this time can be regarded as a response to this.
…
Before Christmas, Digital UK acquired British set-top box manufacturer PUMA PLC for £10 million.
Puma PLC is not a large company, with only a small factory in Birmingham, but their technical level is quite good.
After acquiring Puma PLC, Digital UK changed its name to Puma Electronics and, with subsequent orders and £20 million in funding, invested in Digital UK's three OEM factories in China, holding a 60% stake.
As a result, the three factories in Shenzhen will be merged into Puma Electronics (Huaxia), which will use the funds invested by Digital UK to upgrade equipment and open a larger new factory to fully produce set-top boxes for the Freeview platform.
This decision was made because within this month, the first two batches of set-top boxes produced by the Huaxia factory have arrived in the UK and distributed to users of the Freeview platform. Their quality has been recognized by Digital UK. Although the failure rate is slightly higher than that of locally produced set-top boxes, the greatly reduced costs and faster production efficiency have made Digital UK extremely satisfied.
After all, this kind of set-top box product, to put it bluntly, will only be a transitional product. With the popularization of digital TV in the future, the current set-top box products will certainly continue to be upgraded, so that users can use it for two or three years, which is enough to fully meet their needs.
Therefore, Digital UK also put out a certain amount of funds, and after acquiring Puma PLC, another local set-top box manufacturer it had previously chosen, it established Puma Electronics Company and invested in the Chinese factory on a larger scale.
In the future, in addition to producing set-top boxes mainly for Freeview platform users, Puma Electronics (Huaxia) will also participate in the competition for set-top boxes in the Huaxia market.
The reason for first acquiring the local Puma PLC company is, on the one hand, to obtain the company's technical personnel, and on the other hand, using the British brand Puma will more easily give users a "high-end" impression both in overseas markets and in the local Chinese market.
According to Digital UK's forecast, by New Year's Day 2003, the number of users accessing the Freeview platform will exceed 200,000. With the release of larger set-top box production capacity, the number of users of the Freeview platform will be able to directly exceed 2 million households in the first quarter of 2003!
Judging from the current user reservation situation, it is very likely that the number will increase by 1 million households per month.
It is worth mentioning that at this time in 2002, the local government of China was very welcoming to projects like Puma Electronics (Huaxia), which accepted foreign investment and whose main products were "export-earning projects".
It is also for this reason that when Puma Electronics acquired the three factories and expanded its operations, the local government was extremely cooperative and provided Puma Electronics (Huaxia) with a piece of land at a low price in the development zone for the construction of a new factory.
As the DSTV TV channel was about to be launched and the series "Downton Abbey" was to be broadcast, there were different voices at Summit Media.
In particular, Bonnie, who is responsible for the production of "Downton Abbey", believes that the number of users of the Freeview platform at this time is only 200,000 households, which is far less than the number of users of the ITV1 channel when they broadcast "The Traitors" before. In this case, the audience for the broadcast of "Downton Abbey" is only these 200,000 Freeview platform viewers. For such a meticulous production of "Downton Abbey", it is really a bit disappointing.
Indeed, the Freeview platform has only been promoted for two months, and due to the previous limitation of the production of set-top boxes, its number of users is still pitifully small.
But in Barron's previous life, even in 2010 when the audience for TV programs was decreasing, "Downton Abbey" was a phenomenal TV series, which caused a huge response not only in Britain but also around the world, and had countless fans - this was also the reason why the first film version, which cost only 30 million pounds to produce, earned hundreds of millions of box office, thanks to its huge fan base.
But if it is played on the Freeview platform now, I am afraid its effect will be greatly reduced.
In this regard, Barron still insisted on the original plan and still premiered "Downton Abbey" on New Year's Day. The reason is that even in the early stages, due to the small number of users on the Freeview platform, there may be few viewers for this TV series.
But you have to know that the Freeview platform where the SDTV channels are located is a digital TV platform. Up to now, Digital UK has been innovating its technology and will soon be able to withdraw the on-demand service.
By then, the way TV programs are broadcast will no longer require viewers to wait for the program schedule on time to watch their favorite TV programs or TV series. Instead, they can watch some programs that have been broadcast directly through the Freeview platform at any time through on-demand viewing, and even download them to their set-top boxes - the set-top box itself provides a certain amount of storage space. Of course, the downloaded content is encrypted and cannot be transferred to other playback platforms.
Of course, this additional service will definitely require a certain fee.
But it also solved the problem that the Freeview platform had insufficient users in the early stage, and when the user base expanded later, new users missed out on previously aired dramas.
This is a bit similar to the video platforms of the future. The most important thing is not the number of views of the first broadcast, but the total number of clicks. Regardless of the content of the series or the advertisements inserted in it, the most important thing is not the one-time delivery quantity, but the cumulative delivery range.
And as long as the series of "Downton Abbey" is good enough, when the number of users of the Freeview platform is limited at this time, it will produce an effect similar to "hunger marketing", making more users eager to join the Freeview platform.
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