Premiere Chooses NDS VideoGuard® to Secure Its Pay-TV Platforms in Germany and Austria

Highlights
Premiere selects VideoGuard®, NDS’ market-leading content protection technology, to secure its satellite platforms
Migration to VideoGuard starts in second calendar quarter of 2008
Being selected to secure Premiere’s satellite subscriber base represents another major success for NDS in Germany

NDS, the leading provider of technology solutions for digital pay-TV, today announced that Premiere, the largest pay-TV operator in Germany and Austria, will deploy VideoGuard®, the market-leading content protection solution from NDS, to secure its pay-TV satellite platforms in Germany and Austria.

During the coming months Premiere and NDS will be working closely to smoothly migrate the operator’s satellite platforms and set-top box (STB) population to VideoGuard, the world’s leading conditional access (CA) system which now protects over 82.7 million active devices worldwide. As part of this process, smart cards currently deployed will be replaced and VideoGuard software will be downloaded to existing STBs. New STBs will be equipped with VideoGuard. Premiere will deploy NDS’ leading edge security technology to its subscribers seamlessly, with no interruption to reception of programming.

In order to facilitate this migration process, Premiere plans to use Simulcrypt technology in collaboration with its incumbent CA provider.

Having already selected NDS’ MediaHighway® middleware in 2006 to enhance its pay-TV business, Premiere will now benefit from the advantages of an end-to-end technology infrastructure from NDS, enabling the operator to securely deliver pay-TV content as well as value-added, innovative services to its subscribers. NDS middleware has been deployed in over 76.4 million devices worldwide. Following major recent deployments of VideoGuard in Germany, this new announcement represents the fourth agreement for NDS’ content protection solutions in Germany.

Hans Seger, Chief Program and Technology Officer of Premiere, said: “We decided to select NDS VideoGuard because of its unsurpassed track record in securing digital Pay-TV platforms around the world. A robust security technology is absolutely a pre-requisite in order to achieve sustainable high growth for our pay-TV operations,” he said. “We look forward to benefitting from a fully secured platform and to developing new value added services for our subscribers based on our end-to-end digital TV solution from NDS. In line with previous announcements we will be starting the swap-out in the second quarter,” he continued.

Mr Seger added: “A secure encryption system is the most important pre-condition for the pay TV business model to be successful. We decided to select NDS VideoGuard as it is regarded as the safest conditional access system in the world.”

Yves Padrines, Managing Director NDS GmbH and NDS Director, Business Development, said: “We are more than proud to expand our existing technology partnership with Premiere by now also providing VideoGuard content protection. Being the largest pay TV operator in Germany and Austria, Premiere’s decision to choose VideoGuard is the ultimate endorsement for the leadership of NDS security technology. We are looking forward to actively supporting Premiere by protecting their premium content and enabling new engaging services for customers.”

About Premiere

Premiere is the leading pay TV operator in Germany and Austria. Today, about 11 million viewers in about 4.2 million subscriber households (including approximately 630,000 Arena and Unitymedia customers to whom Premiere provides Top League Bundesliga football coverage) are tuned in to enjoy Germany’s finest television. See www.premiere.de or www.info.premiere.de for more information about Premiere.

About NDS

NDS Group plc (NASDAQ: NNDS), a majority owned subsidiary of News Corporation, supplies open end-to-end digital technology and services to digital pay-television platform operators and content providers. See www.nds.com for more information about NDS.

Cautionary Statement Concerning Forward-looking Statements

This document may contain certain “forward-looking statements” within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These statements are based on management’s views and assumptions regarding future events and business performance as of the time the statements are made. Actual results may differ materially from these expectations due to changes in global economic, business, competitive market, regulatory and other factors. More detailed information about these and other factors that could affect future results is contained in our filings with the US Securities and Exchange Commission. Any “forward-looking statements” included in this document are made only as of the date of this document and we do not have any obligation, nor do we undertake, to publicly update any “forward-looking statements” to reflect subsequent events or circumstances, except as required by law.

Contacts

NDS
Cynthia Ritchie
Director, Corporate Communications
T: +44 20 8476 8378
critchie {at} nds(.)com
or
Susbauer PR for NDS
Matthias Frey
T: +49 221 120 123
m.frey {at} susbauer(.)de
or
Breakaway Communications for NDS
Kelly Fitzgerald, Managing Partner
T: +1 212 616 6006
kfitz {at} breakawaycom(.)com