Stanley S. Hubbard founded United States Satellite Broadcasting and was a leading proponent for the development of direct broadcast satellite service in the United States. USSB was awarded 5 frequencies at the coveted 101 degree west satellite location by the FCC. Hughes Communications, a unit of GM Hughes Electronics, a remnant of Howard Hughes’s company, was also awarded 27 frequencies at the same 101 degree location. After waiting many years, the technology evolved to enable the building of very high power satellites and digital compression (MPEG 2) standards were developed that allowed multiple digital television channels to be sent through each satellite frequency. After Hughes failed to complete a joint venture to launch the first high power digital television service called Sky Cable, the company created DIRECTV and secured an agreement with USSB to build and launch the first high power DBS satellite system. Hughes/DIRECTV then turned to Thomson Consumer Electronics (under the RCA brand) to develop the digital satellite system for the service that would be capable of receiving 175 channels on a small 18-inch dish. These dishes utilized a new generation of smaller, lighter receiver dishes based on military technology introduced by the Global Broadcast System (GBS), which predated DirecTV’s viability by almost 10 years. Hughes was awarded the contract to build and launch the new high powered satellites and USSB and DIRECTV agreed that the new satellites would carry the two separate programming services: USSB and Direct TV.
On Friday, June 17, 1994, the USSB and DirecTV programming services were launched. Digital Equipment Corporation provided the hardware for DIRECTV, Matrix Marketing provided customer care, and DBS Systems created the billing software, and is still the provider to this day.
In 1998, DirecTV acquired USSB for $1.3 billion.
In 1999, DirecTV acquired PrimeStar for $1.83 billion.
In 2000, DirecTV abandoned the Japanese market.
In 2002, DirecTV was the Mexican licensed broadcaster for the 2002 FIFA World Cup
In 2003, a merger with EchoStar, owner of Dish Network, fell through. On December 22, 2003, General Motors sold controlling interest in Hughes Electronics to News Corporation, forming the DirecTV Group. Certain conditions exist, however, in that News Corp must solve disputes with companies that carry its broadcast and cable channels. The corporation must treat all stations equally, not tilt in favor of the Fox Network and FX.
The arbitration was to alleviate concerns that Fox would pull its network programming, which includes professional baseball and football, off cable systems to encourage viewers to subscribe to DirecTV.
News Corp. agreed not to pull either the network programming or its regional sports networks while a dispute was being arbitrated.
In November 2006, News Corporation announced its intention to transfer its managing interest in The DirecTV Group to John Malone’s Liberty Media; in return it bought back Liberty’s shares in News Corp., giving the Murdoch family tighter control of the latter firm.[7] On February 29, 2008, after receiving FCC approval, Liberty completes its acquisition of News Corporation’s shares of DirecTV. Liberty was required by the FCC to sell its shares in either DirecTV’s Puerto Rico operations or Liberty’s cable provider in the island.
In 2004, DirecTV abandoned the Mexican market, though it maintains 41% ownership of Sky Mexico.[5]
On November 15, 2005, DirecTV stopped carrying Music Choice audio-only channels, replacing it with 73 channels of XM Satellite Radio.
In 2007, DirecTV abandons the Brazilian market (the customers being migrated to the 74% DTV-owned Brazilian affiliate of SKY Latin America and Direct TV in Florida).
DirecTV started a major upgrade to support HDTV. On January 9, 2007, DirecTV announced that they would introduce up to 100 national HD channels during 2007, all of which would be MPEG-4 encoded[8]. On October 15, 2007, DirecTV announces that they now have 70 national high-definition channels available, with up to 100 coming by year end. On October 3, 2008, DirecTV announced that it will offer HD local channels in 121 markets by year-end.
* As of June 30, 2007, DirecTV had 16.32 million subscribers.
* On December 13, 2007, DirecTV is reported to buy out ReplayTV.
* On May 4, 2009, DirecTV said it would become a part of Liberty’s entertainment unit, part of which would then be spun off as a separate company called DirecTV. Liberty would increase its share of DirecTV from 48 to 54 percent.
* On August 2009 Directv acquired Home Services Provider Connect Television Inc., increasing it’s workforce by more than a thousand employees.