HBO Expands Asian Footprint

Singapore, 03 July 2009 – HBO Asia, voted top cable television (TV) channel by pay TV operators in Asia*, has expanded its stronghold in Asia by signing new carriage deals in Mongolia and the Philippines, and has increased the distribution of HBO Asia’s multiplex channels - HBO SIGNATURE, HBO FAMILY and HBO HITS, in Cambodia, Indonesia, Palau and Papua New Guinea. In Malaysia, HBO is the first movie channel to offer dual subtitling in both Bahasa Malaysia and Mandarin.

Cambodia

From 1 June 2009, HBO Asia’s channel offerings in Cambodia will increase from two channels, HBO and MAX (a refresh of CINEMAX), to five. Through its distributor, Royal Group, all five HBO Asia multiplex channels, HBO, HBO SIGNATURE, HBO FAMILY, HBO HITS and MAX, will be available on various cable TV operators throughout Cambodia.

Indonesia

As of 1 July 2009, Indonesia ’s Indovision will add HBO HITS and HBO FAMILY to their channel offerings, therefore making available to their subscribers all five of HBO Asia’s bouquet of multiplex channels. Indovision will be the second cable operator in Indonesia, other than First Media, to offer all of HBO Asia’s five multiplex channels. HBO, HBO SIGNATURE, and MAX are also available to subscribers of Telkomvision.

Mongolia

HBO Asia has recently inked a new carriage deal with Mongolia’s DDish TV making all five HBO multiplex channels, HBO, HBO SIGNATURE, HBO FAMILY, HBO HITS and MAX, available for the first time to subscribers of this satellite operator in Mongolia from 1 June 2009. HBO and MAX has been available to subscribers of Mongolia’s Super Cable Vision TV since mid 2002.

Palau

From 1 July 2009, Palau National Communications Corporation (PNCC) subscribers in Palau will be able to enjoy three more of HBO Asia’s multiplex channels, HBO SIGNATURE, HBO FAMILY, HBO HITS, in addition to the existing HBO Asia channel offerings of HBO and MAX.

Papua New Guinea

In Papua New Guinea, HiTron Pty Ltd added three of HBO Asia’s multiplex channels, HBO SIGNATURE, HBO FAMILY and HBO HITS, to their existing HBO channel offerings which include HBO and MAX, since 1 May 2009.

The Philippines

In the Philippines, HBO Asia has signed a new carriage deal with newly launched direct-to-home (DTH) pay TV operator, Cignal DTV. Owned by Mediascape, Inc. a wholly-owned subsidiary of Mediaquest Holdings, Inc. (a subsidiary of the PLDT Beneficial Trust Fund), Cignal DTV has been offering HBO to its subscribers since 1 April 2009 and will be launching more HBO Asia channels soon. Subscribers of Sky Cable currently enjoy all five of HBO Asia’s multiplex channels.

Malaysia

In addition to the expansion of HBO Asia’s bouquet of channels in the various territories in Asia, HBO is also the first movie channel to offer dual subtitles in Malaysia. Since 1 May 2009, subscribers of the Astro movie package can choose between Bahasa Malaysia and Mandarin subtitles when watching programs on HBO.

Currently, HBO has a viewing subscriber base of more than 31 million and is seen in 22 countries throughout Asia - including Bangladesh, Brunei, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Macau, Maldives, Malaysia, Mongolia, Nepal, Pakistan, People’s Republic of China, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand, the Philippines, Vietnam, and on military bases in South Korea . HBO offers closed-captioned subtitling in Bahasa Indonesia, Bahasa Malaysia, Cyrillic, English, Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese, Thai, and Vietnamese.

HBO Asia’s bouquet of multiplex channels include HBO, the blockbuster movie channel; HBO SIGNATURE, which offers entertaining, groundbreaking movies and series including HBO Original productions for the discerning viewer; HBO FAMILY, providing movies for everyone in the family; HBO HITS, for the busy viewer who only wants to watch 100% cinema hits, and MAX (a refresh of CINEMAX), the most exciting channel for action, suspense and science-fiction movies and series. HBO Asia also has a Subscription Video On Demand service, HBO ON DEMAND, in selected markets.

* HBO retains overall lead for the third year running in the 2009 Pay TV Operators Survey conducted by Fusion Consulting and ContentAsia. HBO took the lion’s share of 20%, double that of the next closest competitor. HBO dominated in the movies genre with close to half of the respondents voting HBO as the best channel in terms of programming quality. HBO keeps its top position for providing the best overall marketing and sales support. The survey showed that HBO is the channel of choice for pay TV operators in Asia as HBO receives the most positive feedback from subscribers and that HBO offers the best value for money, trumping the next closest channel by almost three times. The survey was conducted among 39 cable operators, from 16 countries.

Singapore-based HBO Asia is able to bring the best of Hollywood to Asia first because of its exclusive licensing deals with major Hollywood studios - Columbia/TriStar, Paramount Pictures, Universal Studios and Warner Bros. HBO Asia offers five commercial-free premium programming subscription movie services – HBO®, HBO SIGNATURESM, HBO FAMILYSM, HBO HITSSM and MAXSM (a refresh of CINEMAXSM) – as well as a subscription video on demand service, HBO ON DEMANDSM. In addition to the proprietary and award-winning HBO Original programs that are produced exclusively for HBO viewers, HBO works with a large number of major independent production companies to secure exclusive rights to a host of quality movies. HBO Asia is a joint venture of HBO and Paramount. Log on to www.hboasia.com for more information.