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To: H James Morris who wrote (81250)	10/19/1999 9:35:00 PM
From: Glenn D. Rudolph	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 164684

Bertelsmann to launch interactive TV in Spring 2000 MUNICH, Germany, Oct 19 (Reuters) - German media giant Bertelsmann <BTGGga.DE> said on Tuesday it had formed alliances with regional cable operators for the country's first major pilot run of interactive television in spring 2000. The new service, carried over cable networks upgraded for high-speed broadband services, will include movies, music videos, documentaries and travel programming linked to Internet content from Bertelsmann partner America Online <AOL.N> and AOL's CompuServe unit. Bertelsmann and America Online jointly operate AOL Europe. The head of the Bertelsmann Broadband Group, Werner Lauff, told a news conference at the Munich Media Fair that it would also allow viewers to access online shopping services, such as Bertelsmann's BOL Internet bookshop, via the TV set-top box. Bertelsmann New Media President Bernd Schiphorst described the move as part of Bertelsmann's aggressive expansion into multimedia services. "We have assembled an enormous amount of experience in online business and are now putting it toward interactive television," Schiphorst said. "This looks like television but works like the Internet." The test phase will begin in 10 German cities on the regional cable networks of Tele-Columbus, Bosch Telecom, Wilhelm.Tel and PrimaCom, Schiphorst said. He added that Bertelsmann was still in talks with fellow cable company TSS and that additional deals for content and equipment would follow. Schiphorst said he expected interactive television to pose a real threat in the long run to pay-TV services like Germany's Premiere World, held by the Kirch Group, the country's second largest media group behind Bertelsmann. The project, which does not yet have a brand name, will profit from several revenue streams including a basic fee, service-based fees, advertising and electronic commerce. Schiphorst declined to provide details on the cost of the service, the size of Bertelsmann's investment or how the partners would share revenues, saying that the aim of the pilot programme was to test programming, price and service models. The company also declined to estimate how many households would be served in the initial phase or how long the test phase would last. Tele-Columbus, a unit of Deutsche Bank's DB Investor holding, last month announced a broadband partnership with ExciteAtHome <ATHM.O> for high-speed Internet access in Germany via broadband cable networks. Lauff said that ExciteAtHome was not among its initial partners. REUTERS Rtr 14:53 10-19-99