Charlie, Don’t Blame the Messenger

Which is it Charlie, an HDTV delay or no delay?

Early this week Charlie Ergen’s Dish Network told the Securities and Exchange Commission that a snag in the launch of a new bird, AMC-14, was going to delay the satellite provider’s rollout of some HDTV channels.

The 8-K filing prompted several very negative newspaper stories and Wall Street analysts’ reports, including a particularly biting one from Sanford Bernstein’s Craig Moffett.

But lo and behold, a day after its 8-K filing, Dish Network issued a press release that announced that plans for its HDTV expansion this year remained on schedule, despite the AMC-14 “launch anomaly.” 

Say what? What about that little missive you filed with the SEC Monday, Charlie?

I asked Dish for an explanation of the different company messages regarding its HD schedule – delay versus plans-still-on-track — but was told the company would not be making any additional comments.

In a canned quote in the press release Tuesday, Ergen assured Dish customers that the HD expansion will proceed as planned, and that  Dish has two more satellites set to launch later this year. All this, yet in that fourth-quarter conference call Ergen had noted that AMC-14 would play an important role in Dish’s HD expansion, for local markets in particular.

Why all the fuss over the AMC-14 bird, which wound up in a lower orbit than it should have when it was launched last Friday?

The new satellite capacity will enable Dish to offer more HDTV services, and the satellite provider can’t afford – competitively – to lag behind in the HDTV gold rush.

It has to try to keep pace with leader DirecTV, by offering as many national and local HDTV networks as possible. In fact, back in February Ergen admitted that satellite-launch delays last year had hurt Dish Network competitively, by making it fall behind in the cutthroat HDTV arms race.

Ergen’s Dish cohorts went so far as to blame the press for reporting misinformation about AMC-14. Yes, Dish EVP Jim DeFranco said it was all our [the Fourth Estate’s] fault during a chat – apparently aimed at damage control — with Dish retailers Tuesday, according to www.SatelliteGuys.us, the Web site of Multichannel News blogger Scott Greczkowski.

Like Ergen, DeFranco told retailers that Dish’s HD plans were full speed ahead. 

Well, the only thing we ink-stained wretches reported was the content of the two-paragraph 8- K filing regarding AMC-14.

The first graph is about the problems with the launch.

Here is the second graph, verbatim: “We intended to lease the entire capacity of the satellite from EchoStar Communications in order to, among other things, increase the number of high-definition channels we offer. Therefore, the launch anomaly will result in a delay in our roll out of some high-definition channels, including some local network channels.”