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Mediaquest Holdings Inc. is allotting around P700 million for its capital expenditure this year. The media unit of Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. is earmarking the said amount for its satellite TV business year to increase its subscriber base to 200,000.

At the end of 2009, Cignal Digital TV, Mediaquest’s direct-to-home satellite television has 45,000 subscribers nationwide, barely five months of operation from its official launch in July last year. The number of Cignal subscribers is expected to surge this year, said Mediaquest director Ray Espinosa, following the company’s success of its satellite TV business.

Cignal is the latest subscription-based direct-to-home satellite television service provider using the NSS-11 satellite of New Skies Satellite. It comes in Cignal HD (high definition) and Cignal Digital TV. It was on a test broadcast since January of 2009 in Bulacan, Rizal, Cavite and Laguna and has 3,000 subscribers who signed up then.

The Cignal Basic package is available for a one-time fee of P4,700 for set top box, satellite dish and cables and Cignal card, and installation fee of P1,000 and a monthly service charge of P390. It has 20 standard definition channels which include free-to-air local channels ABS-CBN, TV5, NBN 4, GMA, CS9, QTV, IBC 13, Studio 23, 2nd Avenue, Etc, and Net 25, and the premium channels HBO, Disney Channel, Cartoon Network, CNN, PBO, Viva Cinema, AXN, and BIO. RHTV (dzRH Television). Aside from the TV channels, radio channels from the FM band are also available to Cignal Digital TV subscribers.

The Cignal Combo package is available for a one-time fee of P4,800, an installation fee of P1,000 and a monthly service fee of P790. It includes three high-definition channels plus the Cignal Basic. The Cignal HD, on the other hand, offers three high-definition channels – Voom, History Channel and Playhouse Disney.

Espinosa said they are not competing with cable TV companies because their target markets are those in the remote areas.