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India's Zee TV Expands Direct-to-Home Offering With Snell & Wilcox Standards Converters

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DELHI, India -- Dec. 19, 2006 -- India's largest vertically integrated media and entertainment company, Zee Telefilms Limited (Zee), is using advanced CVR 550 multiformat standards converters from Snell & Wilcox to expand its direct-to-home offering. Twelve new CVR 550 standards converters, part of the high-performance Kudos Plus line, allow Zee TV to convert television programming from any standard, including PAL, SECAM, and NTSC, for delivery to its viewing audience.

"As India's pioneering general entertainment network, broadcasting in six languages nationally as well as supplying feeds to international audiences, we are providing our viewers with offerings in every genre -- film, news, fiction, action, celebrity shows, comedies, game shows, and more," said Zee TV Assistant VP Technical Ravi Puri. "To provide this range of programming, we require high-quality standards conversion. The Snell & Wilcox Kudos Plus range provides this quality and enables us to expand our offerings to the direct-to-home market seamlessly while maintaining the programming quality on which we have built our reputation."

Zee, the largest producer and aggregator of Hindi programming in the world, is not only one of the most popular entertainment brands in India, but also the largest MSO in India, with an estimated reach of 6.5 million households. The company has been incorporating Snell & Wilcox equipment, including standards converters and a range of IQ Modular infrastructure gear, into its digital infrastructure for more than two years. 

"The tremendous reach of Zee TV and the diversity of its programming requires a high quality of standards conversion " said Joe Zaller, VP of marketing, Snell & Wilcox Limited. "With a dozen CVR 550 systems in place, Zee TV is able to convert and distribute virtually any media asset without compromising quality, regardless of the standard in which that material was originated."

The Kudos Plus CVR 550 is an advanced multiformat four-field, four-line aperture standards converter designed to deliver excellent results at an economical price point. Just 1 RU in size, the CVR 550 provides full bidirectional operation between composite PAL, NTSC, and SECAM standards, as well as 10-bit SDI signals, along with AES audio handling.

The compact converter's performance, size, and price make it ideal for a wide range of applications including mobile applications, news, and transmission. Like all Snell & Wilcox conversion solutions, the CVR 550 is fully compatible with the RollCall monitoring system and IQ Modular infrastructure systems, which simplify management of processing and distribution across the Zee facility and television channels.

More information about the CVR 550, the entire Kudos Plus range, and other Snell & Wilcox technologies is available at www.snellwilcox.com.

Zee Telefilms Limited (Zee) (BSE: ZEE.BO and NSE: ZEE.NS) is India's largest vertically integrated media and entertainment company. Zee has an integrated range of businesses, encompassing the content-to-consumer value chain of media and entertainment business. Zee is the largest producer and aggregator of Hindi programming in the world, with more than 30,000 hours of original programming in the library. One of the most popular entertainment brands in India, it was ranked as the ninth most popular brand within a decade of its launch. It is also the largest MSO in India, with an estimated reach of 6.5 million households, and one of the largest Indian multiple distribution platforms with an estimated reach of 350 million viewers in more than 120 countries globally including the United States, Canada, Europe, Africa, the Middle East, South East Asia, Australia, and New Zealand.

Zee TV, in its 10 years of service to viewers, has won numerous viewers' choice awards for its programs both in India and abroad. It reaches more than 225 million viewers across more than 80 countries and in India reaches 93 percent of cable and satellite households in the Hindi-speaking belt, higher than any other satellite channel. More information is available at www.zeetelevision.com.

Snell & Wilcox designs and builds the world's most advanced systems for video playout, mastering, repurposing, infrastructure, and live production switching. Providing solutions that deliver immediate value while enabling a controlled and cost-effective transition to HD and file-based systems, the company serves a worldwide base of customers in the broadcast, postproduction, cable, satellite, mobile TV, and IPTV markets. In business since 1973, Snell & Wilcox maintains its U.S. headquarters in Burbank, Calif., and European headquarters in Hampshire, U.K. Additional offices are located in New York, China, France, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Lebanon, Malaysia, and Russia. Further information is available at www.snellwilcox.com.

Press Contact: Susan Warren, Wall Street Communications, Phone +1 631 261 1013 or E-mail: susan@wallstreetcom.tv.

Snell & Wilcox, Putting Pictures To Work, Kudos Plus, IQ modular, and RollCall are all trademarks of the Snell & Wilcox Group.