About this service
Legally, cable television is far more than a technical service: under the Law of Georgia on Broadcasting, a cable operator occupies a dual position — on one hand, it is a person authorised for broadcasting transit whose activity is carried out under the commission's regulation, and on the other, by redistributing television channels it is an intermediary between the broadcaster and the consumer. From these two roles flows the entire set of obligations this page sets out: the authorisation procedure and conditions, the must-carry and paid transit regimes, the good-faith requirements and the avenues of dispute before the commission.
Grounds of activity: authorisation, not a licence
Under Article 36 of the law, for the purposes of authorisation and licensing the broadcasting sphere comprises media services and video-sharing platform services. Activity in this sphere is carried out by the public broadcaster and the public broadcaster Adjara Television and Radio, as well as on the basis of a licence and/or authorisation. The decisive detail follows: activity in the broadcasting sphere, with the exception of airwave radio broadcasting, is subject to authorisation, while a licence is issued only for radio broadcasting and only where it is carried out through broadcasting transmitters using radio-frequency spectrum. A cable operator that distributes the signal over a cable network rather than by terrestrial transmission therefore falls within the authorisation regime.
Must-carry transit: who may demand channel placement
Article 40¹ of the law imposes the heaviest obligation on a cable operator. The public broadcaster, a community broadcaster, a duly authorised general airwave and/or satellite broadcaster operating within the service delivery zone of a person authorised for broadcasting transit (for the purposes of this article, a satellite broadcaster's zone is the entire territory of the country), as well as an authorised general airwave broadcaster whose broadcasting is accessible to at least 20% of Georgia's population, are entitled to demand placement of their television channel in every package offered to consumers — "must-carry transit". In that case the broadcaster acquires no right to demand remuneration from the operator for transit of its signal: must-carry transit is free of charge.
The procedure is also prescribed in detail. The broadcaster submits the demand to the operator at its legal address by registered mail, with a copy to the commission. The broadcaster must, at its own expense and on a one-off basis, provide the operator with the technical means necessary for distributing the signal in the network and ensure delivery of the signal to the satellite. The commission sets the technical parameters, and the operator must fulfil the must-carry demand within 14 days of the provision of the technical means. The conditions of must-carry transit are periodically reviewed, and in the case of must-carry or paid transit the operator must carry out the transit unchanged.