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The History of cable TV in the uk

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History of cable TV in the UK
Cable TV in the UK has its origins as far back as 1938, when towns such as Bristol used wires to carry television signals to homes that couldn't receive transmissions over the air. It wasn't until the '60s, however, that a more useful version of the system came along, courtesy of Rediffusion Vision, that relayed four channels of 625-line signals from the BBC and ITA stations.

In the early eighties the government signaled (no pun intended) its intent to give cable TV - by this time already well established in the United States - the go-ahead, mainly to assist in the push to introduce competition in the telecoms market that would come in the early nineties. More on that later.

Rediffusion Vision renamed itself Rediffusion Cablevision in the early eighties, and began supplementing its CATV (Community Antenna TeleVision - e.g. the re-broadcasting of over-the-air signals down cables) service with other channels such as the Music Box, Screensport, Sky Channel, and TEN. (More details about Rediffusion can be found on Edwin J Hearn's dedicated website.)

1984 and 1985 were key years in the development of next-generation cable services. In 1984, Swindon Cable was the first operator to be licenced under a new regime that would see cable franchises be scattered around the UK. 1985 saw the establishment of the Cable Authority, which started to advertise more licences around the country; the first to go operational was Aberdeen Cable, later known as Atlantic.

In 1991, the cable companies were granted the right to offer telephony alongside their TV services - this would prove crucial in the battle against the satellite operator BSkyB, created as a result of a merger between BSB and Sky television.

It was the development of "broadband" cable, capable of supporting a 750MHz+ bandwidth and served by a fibre-optic backbone that took cable TV forward in the mid-nineties. By then, consolidation was the key, with the first major acquisition being the American company International CableTel purchasing Insight Communications along with franchise-holders in South Wales and other regions. 1994 was a big build year for the industry, as it sought to cover as many homes as possible in order to rival satellite provider Sky.

Slowly but surely, the small cable operators that had been licenced by the old Cable Authority - by now incorporated into the ITC - were swallowed up by the larger players, such as International CableTel, Cable & Wireless and Telewest Communications. In 1996, CableTel bought National Transcommunications Ltd - NTL - and decided to use that name for all its operations. The old names didn't disappear overnight however, living on in a hybrid arrangement - NTL CableTel, NTL Comcast and NTL Diamond Cable being examples. Meanwhile, Telewest was busily extending its coverage, purchasing franchises in Birmingham and Yorkshire among others.

1999 was truly a monumental year, with ntl (as it was now known), buying Cable and Wireless' UK cable operations - which now contained digital TV capability in some franchises. There had been much speculation that either ntl or Telewest - by now the big players in the cable industry after most of the consolidation had been done. The general consensus was that there was room only for two big operators to rival Sky - and that it wouldn't be long before ntl and Telewest leapt into bed. That has yet to happen.

November of that year also saw Telewest launch its "Active Digital" service. Also in 1999, Telewest gained full control of Cable London after ntl sold its 50% stake in that operator. It wasn't until May of 2000 that ntl started rolling out "digitalplus" in some of its franchises, and all cable operators took a substantial length of time to upgrade the old legacy cable systems to support digital service. Even today, some franchises aren't yet capable of providing digital service.

The development of interactive cable TV, utilising the return path of the new broadband systems, is still ongoing. ntl and Telewest both provided access to a "walled garden" of adapted-for-TV websites after launching their digital services, although again rolling this out across their myriad of franchises - bearing in mind that the corporate consolidation took place much faster than did the actual network consolidation - proved to be a "long haul" task. It is only recently that "enhanced" interactivity synchronised with a live TV programme has come online, with Telewest being the first to roll this out to their customers. ntl followed afterwards, and is still rolling this capability out network-wide.