Sun Direct, one of the DTH service providers in India announced the launch of High Definition (HD) DTH service in the country, claiming it to be the first of its kind in India.

Sun Direct says it is launching the HD services on a commercial scale now having conducted trials of the service from April 2009. The services will be launched for 5 channels namely Hindi GEC, Tamil GEC, English Movies, Kids, Educational and Tamil/Telugu Movies in India.

For the new initiative the company has tied up with Samsung Electronics which will act as touch point for customers who want to experience the HD content. Apart from LCD TVs which support HD services, Samsung will also provide HD set top box to Sun Direct.

Speaking on the occasion Mr. Tony D’Silva, COO of Sun Direct said, “We believe that in the constantly changing viewer-ship dynamics, to keep the viewer continuously happy and engaged we need to offer them new and exciting options and HD is another first from the Sun Direct stable. We believe that HD is the future of television and as far as viewing is concerned it is a visual delight. Samsung is a great brand and they are globally the experts in the television technology venturing with Samsung as our support and manufacturing partners will pay rich dividends. We have added more customers than any other DTH player in the last one year and in the coming days we will be adding more innovative features and value added services on our platform.”

Speaking on the occasion, stated Mr Pil Young Kim, Sr Vice President and General Manager , Internet Infra Team ,  Samsung Telecommunications System Division  Division, “ Samsung has worked closely with many leading PayTV Operators around the world in launching HD services and we are truly excited to add Sun Direct to our established partnerships.”