Stock Watch

Blockbuster Inc., a movie rental chain, said on late Tuesday that the company is suffering from liquidity problems and there are possibilities that the company may have to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Blockbuster said that the company will file Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection if it is unable to generate enough cash flow to meet or restructure its debt commitments.

Blockbuster blamed the increasing competition for its decreasing cash flow. The company provided all this information in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing.

Union Minister of State for IT and Communications Sachin Pilot today unveiled the country's first Fiber to The Home (FTTH) service at Jaipur with a view to service superior video and data services.

It is reported that the FTTH service was inaugurated by minister of state for communications & IT Sachin Pilot in the presence of BSNL CMD Kuldeep Goyal and G K Agrawal, CGM, BSNL Rajasthan circle here on Saturday.

UK's popular media group Virgin Media is making trials for rolling out a fibre optic high-speed broadband service through telegraph poles. The company said that the idea behind launching broadband over telegraph poles is to expand its reach to the consumers.

Broadband through telegraph poles will make it easier for Virgin Media to reach out to the consumers in the rural areas.

Charles Allen has been appointed as the new chief executive of the Terra Firma owned; EMI Music replacing Elio Leoni-Sceti who is leaving the company amid many court battles and enormous public interest.

Mr. Allen has worked his six years at the British broadcasters Granada and ITV where he broadly earned a reputation of being an 'accountant'. EMI is nearing deadline of mid-June to raise new funds and its new head use his 'accounting' experience.

The third largest multiplex chain in the country, Inox Leisure has planned to raise its open offer price for Fame India in order to face a counter bid by the Reliance Media Works, according to a media report.

The radio unit of the Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group (ADAG), BIG FM has partnered with OnMobile which specializes in Value added services for mobile phones, to launch the BIG Mobile Radio.

Through the radio-programming-led mobile Value Added Service the two companies will offer 17 multi-lingual radio channels across the country to the mobile subscribers. They are also planning to extend the service to countries like Malaysia, Singapore, UAE, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Indonesia.

Many news channels in the country have decided to boycott the third edition of the Indian Premier League.

They say that they have taken the decision due to restrictions placed upon the media by the organizers. The new guidelines state that the news channels can only broadcast clips which are 30 seconds per bulletin. Earlier they were allowed 4 minutes clips per bulletin.

Mexican media giant Televisa has reached a $1.5 billion deal to buy a 30 percent stake in wireless telephone company Nextel Mexico, a unit of NII Holdings to offer the nation's first quadruple play service.

According to Televisa CEO Emilio Azcarraga Jean, "With this venture, we will be able to offer to our customer base the first quadruple play in Mexico, which paves the way for a successful integrated media and telecom strategy."

On Tuesday, giant media company Zee Entertainment posted a 74.49% rise in its net profit for the December quarter. The company also announced that it in the process of consolidating its stake in Ten Sports at 95%.

Media Company Viacom Inc had filed a $1 billion copyright lawsuit against Google's YouTube in 2007. Some reports suggest that the case would gain speed now.

Google and Viacom both prepare themselves for the legal entangle as both the parties requested the judge for a meeting to discuss the individual motions for the planned summary judgment they plan to file.