SES Astra – an SES Global company and Britain’s premier direct-to-home (DTH) satellite business – has clinched an important two-transponder deal with ITV, the UK’s biggest commercial television networK.

ITV, which already has three Astra transponders, will use the additional capacity to expand its digital offer including more regional and interactive services.

The agreement demonstrates the strong UK demand for the 28.2 degrees orbital slot and confirms SES Astra and Britain’s position as the key players in the European satellite market.

Alexander Oudendijk, SES Astra senior vice president of sales and marketing, said: “We are very excited to be extending our business relationship with ITV, which holds an important position in the UK broadcast industry. There can be no greater endorsement of the quality and strength of our service.”

ITV’s broadcast CEO, Mick Desmond, said: “ITV1 is the most popular commercial television channel in Britain, but to stay at the top against a background of continuing digital viewer growth, we need to ensure that we have the transmission capacity to meet our digital strategy objectives.”

“SES Astra was the natural choice when we decided to increase our capacity, not just because of its proven technical expertise and experience, but also because of its unrivalled security and back-up facilities.”

ITV is the biggest commercial television network in the UK and ITV1 is Britain’s most popular commercial TV channel with an average weekly audience of 45 million.

ITV1 is also the UK’s regional channel, broadcasting more than 6000 hours of original programming each year and around half of this output is made outside the M25.

ITV2 is the company’s younger entertainment channel and in 2003 it was the UK’s fastest growing digital channel.

The Astra satellite system is Europe’s leading direct-to-home (DTH) satellite system. It is used by a wide range of broadcast and multimedia companies to deliver free-to-air and pay broadcast as well as broadband services to more than 94 million DTH and cable households in Europe.

Astra’s 13 satellites transmit over 1400 analogue and digital TV and radio channels as well as multimedia and internet services.

Its two prime DTH orbital positions are 19.2 degrees East and 28.2 degrees East. Professional services such as Satellite News Gathering and Cable Contribution transmit from 23.5/24.2 and 5.2 degrees east.