Canal Digital was a Nordic

pay TV Pay television, also known as subscription television, premium television or, when referring to an individual service, a premium channel, refers to subscription-based television services, usually provided by multichannel television providers, b ...

and

internet service provider An Internet service provider (ISP) is an organization that provides a myriad of services related to accessing, using, managing, or participating in the Internet. ISPs can be organized in various forms, such as commercial, community-owned, no ...

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the archipelago of Svalbard also form part of the Kingdom of ...

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. It borders Norway to the west and north, and Finland to the east. At , Sweden is the largest Nordic count ...

Denmark Denmark is a Nordic countries, Nordic country in Northern Europe. It is the metropole and most populous constituent of the Kingdom of Denmark,, . also known as the Danish Realm, a constitutionally unitary state that includes the Autonomous a ...

and

Finland Finland, officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It borders Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of Bothnia to the west and the Gulf of Finland to the south, ...

that was founded in March 1997 as a

joint venture A joint venture (JV) is a business entity created by two or more parties, generally characterized by shared ownership, shared returns and risks, and shared governance. Companies typically pursue joint ventures for one of four reasons: to acce ...

between the French pay TV company Canal+ and the Norwegian

telecommunications Telecommunication, often used in its plural form or abbreviated as telecom, is the transmission of information over a distance using electronic means, typically through cables, radio waves, or other communication technologies. These means of ...

operator

Telenor Telenor ASA ( or ) is a Norwegian majority state-owned multinational telecommunications company headquartered at Fornebu in Bærum, close to Oslo. It is one of the world's largest mobile telecommunications companies with operations worldwi ...

. The number of customers in 2017 was 838,000. From 2003 to 2020, Canal Digital was fully owned by

. In 2004, Telenor Avidi was merged into Canal Digital and changed its name to Canal Digital cable television. In 2020, Canal Digital formed a

with Viasat to form the company Allente. The merger was completed on April 13, 2021. Canal Digital started as a

direct broadcast satellite 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.ITU Radio Regulations, Section IV. Radio Stations and Systems ...

television Television (TV) is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. Additionally, the term can refer to a physical television set rather than the medium of transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertising, ...

service to Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Finland, but later expanded into

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 bro ...

in Norway, Sweden and Denmark,

digital terrestrial television Digital terrestrial television (DTTV, DTT, or DTTB) is a technology for terrestrial television, in which television stations broadcast television content in a digital signal, digital format. Digital terrestrial television is a major technologica ...

in Finland and

IPTV Internet Protocol television (IPTV), also called TV over broadband, is the service delivery of television over Internet Protocol (IP) networks. Usually sold and run by a Telephone company, telecom provider, it consists of broadcast live telev ...

in Sweden and Denmark. More than 2.9 million Nordic households and activities were subscribed to their services.

FTTH Fiber to the ''x'' (FTTX; also spelled "fibre") or fiber in the loop is a generic term for any broadband network architecture using optical fiber to provide all or part of the local loop used for last mile telecommunications. As fiber opt ...

services have slowly started in selected areas in Norway.

Internet access Internet access is a facility or service that provides connectivity for a computer, a computer network, or other network device to the Internet, and for individuals or organizations to access or use applications such as email and the World Wide ...

through the

cable network 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 ...

is based on the EuroDOCSIS standard. Canal Digital's cable system in the newer network areas which included most of Canal Digital's cable networks in Norway was based on

hybrid fibre-coaxial Hybrid fiber-coaxial (HFC) is a broadband telecommunications network that combines optical fiber and coaxial cable. It has been commonly employed globally by cable television operators since the early 1990s. In a hybrid fiber-coaxial cable syst ...

technology. Some other network areas are

copper Copper is a chemical element; it has symbol Cu (from Latin ) and atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkish-orang ...

only, but are subjected to upgrading in order to support new TV

set-top box A set-top box (STB), also known as a cable converter box, cable box, receiver, or simply box, and historically television decoder or a converter, is an information appliance device that generally contains a Tuner (radio)#Television, TV tuner inpu ...

's. Unlike its contemporary DTH rival, Viasat, Canal Digital did not own a TV-network, although during Canal+'s ownership of the company from 1997 to 2003 they had control over the Canal+ channels available in the Nordics at the time, but these were later sold to other companies and were eventually rebranded as C More in 2012. Canal Digital instead opted to secure several multi-year exclusive deals with different TV broadcasters. As of 2011, Canal Digital had exclusive

satellite A satellite or an artificial satellite is an object, typically a spacecraft, placed into orbit around a celestial body. They have a variety of uses, including communication relay, weather forecasting, navigation ( GPS), broadcasting, scient ...

rights with C More Entertainment, ProSiebenSat.1 in Denmark,

Eurosport Eurosport is a group of pay television networks in Europe and parts of Asia, owned and operated by Warner Bros. Discovery through its WBD Sports unit, it operates two main channels—Eurosport 1 and Eurosport 2—across most of its territorie ...

BBC Worldwide BBC Worldwide Ltd. was the wholly owned commercial subsidiary of the BBC, formed out of a restructuring of its predecessor BBC Enterprises in January 1995. The company monetised BBC brands, selling BBC and other British programming for broadcas ...

and

Discovery Communications Discovery, Inc. was an American multinational mass media factual television conglomerate based in New York City. Established in 1982, the company operated a group of factual and lifestyle television brands, such as the namesake Discovery Cha ...

. Satellite exclusivity was more common in the past, but many channels that were once exclusive to Canal Digital have eventually signed agreements with Viasat. Broadcasters that were once exclusive to Canal Digital later joined Viasat include

Sveriges Television Sveriges Television AB ("Sweden's Television aktiebolag, Stock Company"), shortened to SVT (), is the Sweden, Swedish national public broadcasting, public television broadcaster, funded by a public service tax on personal income set by the Riksd ...

(joined Viasat in 2003),

TV4 AB TV4 AB (formerly Nordisk Television AB; previously Trade name, traded as ) is a Swedish media company owned by Telia Company through TV4 Media (formerly known as Bonnier Broadcasting). The company owns the largest commercial television channel in ...

(2005–2006),

National Geographic Channel National Geographic (formerly National Geographic Channel; abbreviated and trademarked as Nat Geo or Nat Geo TV) is an American pay television network and flagship channel owned by the National Geographic Global Networks unit of Disney Enter ...

, ProSiebenSat.1 in Norway and Sweden,

TV 2 (Denmark) TV 2 is a Danish government-owned broadcast and subscription television station, based in Odense, Funen. The station was founded in 1986, and made its first official broadcast in 1988. It makes daily broadcasts of regional and national news, a ...

and

TV 2 (Norway) TV 2 Direkte (''English language, English: TV 2 Live'') is a Norway, Norwegian terrestrial television channel. Its headquarters are located in Bergen, Norway, Bergen. TV 2 began test broadcasting on 13 November 1991, and a year later, it was offi ...

. Their satellite broadcasts can be received from the Thor 5 and Thor 6 satellites at 1°W with any

DVB-S Digital Video Broadcasting – Satellite (DVB-S) is the original DVB standard for satellite television and dates from 1995, in its first release, while development lasted from 1993 to 1997. The first commercial applications were by Canal+ in ...

Receiver Equipped with a Conax Descrambling Module.

Satellite television

High-definition television

Canal Digital was the first major distributor in the region to launch

high-definition television High-definition television (HDTV) describes a television or video system which provides a substantially higher image resolution than the previous generation of technologies. The term has been used since at least 1933; in more recent times, it ref ...

. The first channel, C More HD, was launched in September 2005, using

MPEG-2 MPEG-2 (a.k.a. H.222/H.262 as was defined by the ITU) is a standard for "the generic coding of moving pictures and associated audio information". It describes a combination of lossy video compression and lossy audio data compression methods ...

compression. In June 2006, Canal Digital started broadcasting ''HD-kanalen'' from

and

in Sweden, which did broadcast the

2006 FIFA World Cup The 2006 FIFA World Cup was the 18th FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial international Association football, football world championship tournament. It was held from 9 June to 9 July 2006 in Germany, which had won the right to FIFA World Cup hosts ...

in HD using

MPEG-4 MPEG-4 is a group of international standards for the compression of digital audio and visual data, multimedia systems, and file storage formats. It was originally introduced in late 1998 as a group of audio and video coding formats and related ...

compression. HD-kanalen became SVT HD in October when SVT expanded their HD broadcasts. The major launch of HDTV occurred in Sweden in November 2006 when a special high-definition package with Discovery HD and Voom HD launched and C More HD was rebranded as Canal+ HD. The high-definition package were to be released in the other Nordic countries during 2007. High-definition channels launching in 2007, include Canal+ Sport HD in February, National Geographic Channel HD in April, TV4 HD (Sweden only) in May, Silver HD in September and History HD in December. 2008 brought Kanal 5 HD in January, Eurosport HD in May, Nelonen HD, TVNorge HD in October and

BBC HD BBC HD was a high-definition television channel owned by the BBC. The channel was initially run as a trial from 15 May 2006 until becoming a full service on 1 December 2007 before its discontinuation on 25 March 2013. It broadcast only during ...

in December. Channels launched in 2009, include TV 2 Film HD in January and Animal Planet HD in February. The HD channels were initially offered for as a separate package, but starting on 1 April 2008, this package was dropped in Sweden and the HD channels were included in the "Family" package.

Danish channels

DR1 and DR2 are also available with a premium subscription in Norway, Sweden and Finland. Although TV 2 is broadcast on one of Canal Digital's transponders, it is not a DTH channel. Its only available to the Norwegian cable market, and is not a subscription channel.

Finnish channels

Norwegian channels

Swedish channels

Transnational

Cable television

Norway

As of 23 October 2018, Canal Digital Cable TV was fully fused into Telenor, marketed mainly as Telenor T-We while dropping the Canal Digital name with a primary focus on the T-We app for phones, tablets and Apple TV alongside traditional cable television tuners. This fusing separated Canal Digital Cable TV and Canal Digital Satellite TV customers further to avoid confusion between the two companies for their customers, which after the change had to either contact Telenor T-We or Canal Digital Satellite.

Sweden

Canal Digital in Sweden expanded into cable television in September 2003, when the cable companies Telenor Vision and Sweden Online were merged into Canal Digital.

Terrestrial television

Canal Digital sells decryption cards for digital television in Finland. Prior to the close down of the analogue channels, the package consisted of

Disney Channel Disney Channel is an American pay television television channel, channel that serves as the flagship (broadcasting), flagship property of Disney Branded Television, a unit of the Disney Entertainment business segment of the Walt Disney Company ...

and four C More Entertainment TV channels. When the analogue transmitters were closed down, a new multiplex launched bringing Kino TV,

Nickelodeon Nickelodeon (nicknamed Nick) is an American pay television channel and the flagship property of the Nickelodeon Group, a sub-division of the Paramount Media Networks division of Paramount Global. Launched on April 1, 1979, as the first ca ...

Discovery Channel Discovery Channel, known as The Discovery Channel from 1985 to 1995, and often referred to as simply Discovery, is an American cable channel that is best known for its ongoing reality television shows and promotion of pseudoscience. It init ...

and

MTV MTV (an initialism of Music Television) is an American cable television television channel, channel and the flagship property of the MTV Entertainment Group sub-division of the Paramount Media Networks division of Paramount Global. Launched on ...

to the package. Kino TV is exclusive was exclusive to Canal Digital, while the others were also sold by its competitor, PlusTV. The erotic channel Canal 69 is added on 1 October 2007. The Terrestrial TV Package now consists of: *

*Kino TV *

* Canal+ Film 1 * Canal+ Film 2 * Canal+ Sport 1 *

Canal+ Sport 2 Canals or artificial waterways are waterways or river engineering, engineered channel (geography), channels built for drainage management (e.g. flood control and irrigation) or for conveyancing water transport watercraft, vehicles (e.g. ...

*Canal 69 Canal Digital have expressed interest in selling encryption cards for the

network in Sweden. The Norwegian terrestrial operator

RiksTV RiksTV is the distributor of pay television in the Norwegian digital terrestrial television network. Except for NRK1, NRK2, NRK3/ NRK Super and the NRK radio channels, all broadcasts in the Norwegian DTT network are encrypted. The channels t ...

is partly owned by Canal Digital's owner

IPTV

service was launched in Sweden in 2004. It offers most of channels also provided on the

platform as well as

interactive television Interactive television is a form of Technological convergence#Media, media convergence, adding data services to traditional television technology. It has included on-demand delivery of content, online shopping, and viewer polls. Interactive TV i ...

services and

video on demand Video on demand (VOD) is a media distribution system that allows users to access videos, television shows and films Digital distribution, digitally on request. These multimedia are accessed without a traditional video playback device and a typica ...

from C More Select, C More On demand, Film-To-Home and SF Anytime.

References

External links

Canal Digital

Canal Digital in DenmarkCanal Digital in FinlandCanal Digital in NorwayCanal Digital in Sweden
from LyngSat. {{Authority control Cable television companies of Norway Television networks in Sweden Telecommunications companies established in 1997 Mass media companies established in 1997 Companies based in Bærum Television in Denmark Telenor Direct broadcast satellite services Cable television companies of Sweden Television broadcasting companies of Norway Internet service providers of Norway