NOS,
SGPS S.A. is a Portuguese
telecommunications
Telecommunication is the transmission of information by various types of technologies over wire, radio, optical, or other electromagnetic systems. It has its origin in the desire of humans for communication over a distance greater than that fe ...
and
media
Media may refer to:
Communication
* Media (communication), tools used to deliver information or data
** Advertising media, various media, content, buying and placement for advertising
** Broadcast media, communications delivered over mass el ...
company who provides
mobile
Mobile may refer to:
Places
* Mobile, Alabama, a U.S. port city
* Mobile County, Alabama
* Mobile, Arizona, a small town near Phoenix, U.S.
* Mobile, Newfoundland and Labrador
Arts, entertainment, and media Music Groups and labels
* Mobile ( ...
and
fixed telephony
A landline (land line, land-line, main line, home phone, fixed-line, and wireline) is a telephone connection that uses metal wires or optical fiber telephone line for transmission, as distinguished from a mobile cellular network, which uses ...
,
cable television
Cable television is a system of delivering television programming to consumers via radio frequency (RF) signals transmitted through coaxial cables, or in more recent systems, light pulses through fibre-optic cables. This contrasts with broa ...
,
satellite television
Satellite television is a service that delivers television programming to viewers by relaying it from a communications satellite orbiting the Earth directly to the viewer's location. The signals are received via an outdoor parabolic antenna comm ...
and
internet
The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...
. The company resulted from the merger in 2013 of two of the country's major telecommunications companies: Zon Multimédia (formerly known as PT Multimédia, a spun-off media arm of
Portugal Telecom
Altice Portugal (formerly known as Portugal Telecom or PT) is the largest telecommunications service provider in Portugal. Since June 2, 2015, the company has been a wholly owned subsidiary of Altice Europe, a multinational cable and telecommuni ...
) and
Sonae
Sonae is a multinational business group based in Maia, Porto District, Portugal. It is present in 90 countries, operating in several sectors, including retail, financial services, shopping centres management, software and information systems, me ...
's Optimus Telecommunications.
NOS owns
premium
Premium may refer to:
Marketing
* Premium (marketing), a promotional item that can be received for a small fee when redeeming proofs of purchase that come with or on retail products
* Premium segment, high-price brands or services in marketing, ...
movie channels
TVCine TVCine is a Portuguese premium television brand used on four movie channels, operated by NOS. They showcase recent movies and premieres from all the major studios, as well as comedy, action, classic and old movies.
The TVCine brand was launched on ...
and has a 25% stake in the
Sport TV television network. It also operates 4 channels in joint-venture with
AMC Networks International Southern Europe.
NOS Audiovisuais
NOS Audiovisuais (formerly ZON Lusomundo) is a Portuguese integrated media corporation founded in 1953, which has major interests in movie distribution, cinema theaters and media assets.
It was founded with the purpose of movie distribution, and ...
(formerly ZON Lusomundo) is a
home-video
Home video is prerecorded media sold or rented for home viewing. The term originates from the VHS and Betamax era, when the predominant medium was videotapes, but has carried over to optical disc formats such as DVD, Blu-ray and streaming media ...
and cinema film distributor and operates Nos Cinema, the largest cinema chain of Portugal.
History
NOS was founded as TVCabo in 1994, and was the third cable operator to be founded in Portugal (the first was the regional Cabo TV Madeirense, which was founded in 1992, followed by Bragatel early on in 1994). The first customer was connected in November 1994. Initially the channel offer consisted of thirty channels and the number of Portuguese-speaking channels was initially limited to the terrestrial channels, with the number of Portuguese-speaking channels increasing as the years went on.
The company might be considered a Portuguese
dot-com. In the PT Multimédia days, it brought
Portugal Telecom
Altice Portugal (formerly known as Portugal Telecom or PT) is the largest telecommunications service provider in Portugal. Since June 2, 2015, the company has been a wholly owned subsidiary of Altice Europe, a multinational cable and telecommuni ...
SAPO (a successful web portal and search engine, sold to its parent company in 2005),
Lusomundo
NOS Audiovisuais (formerly ZON Lusomundo) is a Portuguese integrated media corporation founded in 1953, which has major interests in movie distribution, cinema theaters and media assets.
It was founded with the purpose of movie distribution, and ...
(a successful movie distributor,
movie theater
A movie theater (American English), cinema (British English), or cinema hall ( Indian English), also known as a movie house, picture house, the movies, the pictures, picture theater, the silver screen, the big screen, or simply theater is a ...
operator included in the spun off company and, formerly, the owner of the
Diário de Notícias
''Diário de Notícias'' () is a Portuguese daily newspaper published in Lisbon, Portugal. Established since 1864, the paper is considered a newspaper of record for Portugal.
History and profile
''Diário de Notícias'' was first published in ...
newspaper and the
TSF radio, which were sold to Controlinveste the same year as SAPO was sold) and several TV channels such as
SportTV, CNL (now
SIC Notícias
SIC Notícias () is the cable news channel of the Portuguese television network SIC (''Sociedade Independente de Comunicação'') and the second thematic channel of the station. It is available on basic cable and satellite. It replaced CNL (''Cana ...
) and
TVCine TVCine is a Portuguese premium television brand used on four movie channels, operated by NOS. They showcase recent movies and premieres from all the major studios, as well as comedy, action, classic and old movies.
The TVCine brand was launched on ...
(
MOV was only created after the spin-off).
On 17 January 2008, ZON announced it would acquire
TVTEL
TVTEL (TVTEL Comunicações, S.A.) was a Portuguese digital satellite and cable pay television service provider. The satellite service started on June 26, 2007, and it was on the Eurobird 9 satellite, broadcasting FTA and Conax-encrypted channel ...
, its main competitor in both cable and satellite broadcasting in Porto region. Thus, ZON was strengthening its position due to the appearance of a new significant rival,
MEO from
Portugal Telecom
Altice Portugal (formerly known as Portugal Telecom or PT) is the largest telecommunications service provider in Portugal. Since June 2, 2015, the company has been a wholly owned subsidiary of Altice Europe, a multinational cable and telecommuni ...
, using
IPTV
Internet Protocol television (IPTV) is the delivery of television content over Internet Protocol (IP) networks. This is in contrast to delivery through traditional terrestrial, satellite, and cable television formats. Unlike downloaded media, ...
and satellite broadcasting systems, leaving only one other competing cable television and Internet operator in Portugal,
Cabovisão
NOWO (“novo”) is a Portuguese telecommunications company. It is one of the four triple play operators in Portugal.
Apax France and Fortino Capital have been NOWO's shareholders since September 2015. In Portugal, these groups also own the ...
.
On 29 September 2008, ZON Multimédia announced the new mobile product ZON Mobile (
MVNO
A mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) is a wireless communications services provider that does not own the wireless network infrastructure over which it provides services to its customers. An MVNO enters into a business agreement with a mobile ...
), the first real quad play operator in Portugal.
In November 2008,
ZON
NOS, SGPS S.A. is a Portuguese telecommunications and media company who provides mobile and fixed telephony, cable television, satellite television and internet. The company resulted from the merger in 2013 of two of the country's major telecom ...
announced that it would enter the contest for the fifth channel that would be created at the same time as
Digital Terrestrial Television
Digital terrestrial television (DTTV or DTT, or DTTB with "broadcasting") is a technology for terrestrial television in which land-based (terrestrial) television stations broadcast television content by radio waves to televisions in consumers' ...
is introduced in Portugal.
On 17 March 2010, ZON renamed its cable and satellite television service as ZON TV, dropping the 16-year-old TV Cabo brand.
In 2013, a merger with
Optimus (which also included
Optimus Clix
Optimus Clix was one of the triple play brands in Portugal of the telecommunication operator Optimus. Optimus Clix was a competitor of the dominant operator (Portugal Telecom) in the residential market as Internet, telephone and TV service prov ...
, Optimus Kanguru, Optimus Tag, Smart and WTF) was approved and the company was renamed to ZON Optimus. In May 2014, the two brands ZON and Optimus were merged into one single brand, called "NOS" (which is pronounced just like "nós", the Portuguese for “we”, “nodes” or “knots”).
See also
*
Internet in Portugal
The Internet in Portugal achieved a penetration rate of about 64% of the population in 2012. With an average peak Internet access speed of 34.5 megabits per second, Portugal stood seventeenth on the list of countries with the fastest Internet acce ...
References
External links
*
{{Authority control, state=expanded
Telecommunications companies established in 1994
Companies based in Lisbon
Television in Portugal
Internet service providers of Portugal
Mobile phone companies of Portugal
Cable television companies
VoIP companies
Portuguese brands
Portuguese companies established in 1994