Rupert Murdoch's Star Television tied up with Tata group of companies for its direct-to-home foray in India. As per Indian rules, star television held 20 percent stake where as Tata had 80 percent stake in the joint venture. This was coming together of two giants. Star television is a media behemoth whereas Tata group is known for its diversified business and brand values. The company had initially planned to launch its services by mid 2004. The joint venture company was named as Space TV whose total equity was 250 crore.
In the initial stages, Space Television had planned to offer a bouquet of 100 channels using Star's B-Sky-B platform. It also had a pay-per-view system for some of its programmes. To get the DTH services, users had to install a dish antenna of 60 to 90 cm radius along with a set-top box. Set top box was meant to receive television signals transmitted from a satellite. Initial monthly fee was fixed at Rs 400 per month from its subscribers whereas set top box was priced at Rs 5,000.
Space TV received the 'Letter of Intent' from the information and broadcasting ministry for its Ku band service in May 2005. This was followed by a formal license. Since then, DTH service has slowly managed to attract a huge number of subscribers based on its largest digital television platform. Consumers were able to receive wide variety of programming choices that also included several interactive features and top class sound and picture quality.
In July 2005, Tata-Star direct-to-home joint venture renamed itself from Space TV Ltd to Tata Sky Limited and its DTH service was rebranded as T-Sky. The company also signed an agreement with the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) to lease all 12 ku-band transponders on the INSAT 4A satellite for the purpose of providing DTH services to viewers all over India. This also enabled Tata Sky to broadcast more than 150 channels with even better quality.