Vancouver: The backers for Canada’s latest direct-to-home satellite broadcast system promise to deliver programming this fall with all forecast deadlines well intact.

Homestar – a Calgary-based, national dth distribution service approved by the crtc on Jan. 31 – has only to finalize its satellite hookups to begin summer test broadcasts, says Michael d’Avella, senior vp of business planning at 100% owner Shaw Communications. The big satellite questions – as well as questions about programming, costs, hirings, hardware and subscriber marketing – should be answered as early as mid-March.

Of course, it’s the technology that is the most daunting obstacle for Canada’s oft-promised, never-quite-delivered dth services.

For Homestar, the technology specter is especially ominous when Telesat Canada claims it can’t accommodate Homestar on the Anik satellites, u.s. satellite services want long-term deals, other dth services like ExpressVu and Star Choice are higher on the priority list for available satellite capacity, and new Canadian satellites are only expected in the future, not guaranteed.

Mark Pezarro, president of Homestar, maintains there are ways of getting Homestar on Anik E-2 and says he is also entertaining offers from u.s. satellite service providers. ‘One way or the other we’ll be up and running,’ he says.

With the crtc approval, he adds, Homestar can formalize a number of deals that have had to wait for the official okay.

For example, DigiCipher ii digital video compression technology is the leading contender for transmitting the Homestar signals to subscribers.

General Instrument will likely make the receivers, but decisions about who will retail the hardware (dishes and receivers) are still pending. ‘We want to ensure that we come in at a competitive price,’ says Pezarro, explaining that Homestar will provide only the programming. ‘We want to ensure that price is not a barrier for consumers.’

Other details about how Homestar will now come together are few. Up in the air, for example, are the specific signals that will fill Homestar’s 90 video and 30 audio channels.

The crtc decision indicates that the basic service will include programming from at least one station or affiliate of all three national television networks – ctv, cbc and Radio-Canada. Homestar also intends to carry the programming of Television Northern Canada (tvnc) and Cable Public Affairs (cpac) as part of its basic service.

Optional packages in English and French will comprise conventional, specialty, pay-tv and pay-per-view services.

One program Homestar intends to keep is the provision of free decoders to remote schools not already served by cable.

On the business side, Homestar needs to enroll up to 300,000 subscribers in its first year of business, says Pezarro, but the actual number will probably come in at half that target.

Other details about revenues and break-even marks are also being revised and Homestar will not divulge the new projections. Even plans for hiring and subscriber marketing are being held under wraps.

In order to maintain a healthy competitive market, the crtc requires that Homestar operate as a distinct operation from Shaw Communications, a stipulation that eliminates cross-subsidization and preferential treatment stemming from Shaw Cable operations, for example, in negotiations regarding the provision and cost of programming, choices of technology and arrangements regarding satellite space.

The Homestar licence term expires on Aug. 31, 2002, which coincides with the expiry date of the dth licences issued to ExpressVu, Power DirecTv and Star Choice.