The Innovation of the Dish Network

When Dish Network was introduced by EchoStar Communications Corporation a little more than a decade ago, no one imagined it would become such a well known satellite cable service. It has continued to provide viewers with the quality of viewing they are after. Dish Network currently ranks 3rd in the United States among all of the video providers out there.

In order for Dish Network to compete with the big players over the years they have had to take some risks. They were good decisions to make though and allowed Dish Network to emerge as something on the market consumers really responded well to. One of the biggest risks they took early in the game was changing from the big C-band to a smaller sized dish.

Many people thought Dish Network was asking for trouble when they took out a sizable debt to launch Dish Network in China. Luckily the launch was quite successful or Dish Network may not have survived the repercussions.

Probably the biggest and most successful risk Dish Network has taken involved developing their own technology. This concept was implemented in 1996. Since they no longer had to rely on a third party to develop the technology for digital compression or encrypting then they could pull out all the stops. They could also market their services for less because they didn't have that additional expense to cover.

In addition, Dish Network doesn't hide the fact that their CEO and other top executive's extravagant salaries. While they do earn quite a nice figure they also get the benefit of stock options rather than additional money. This helps to keep costs lower and allows more money to be placed into research and development. They work hard to invest the money where it is going to make a difference for the consumer, and cut back in areas where it won't make a difference.

Dish Network carefully selected each member of the technology team for their development. Their engineering staff had years of experience they were able to use as well as the latest advances in technology. Dish Network put all their confidence in the engineers of the program and it was a success. Dish Network also became the first cable company to offer MPEG2.

The biggest challenge for Dish Network right now is the competition. There is plenty of buzz about broadband options for cable. Dish Network has to decide if they want to pursue that avenue or not. If they choose to it could be a very profitable risk down the road for them. If they choose not to they run the risk of losing loyal customers who want what broadband has to offer.

To help make the right decision relating to broadband and other areas of technology, Dish Network is dedicated to exploring all the sides of each type of technology. They also listen to their current customers and potential customers to find out what they want out of their cable services. Since technology continues to change and expand they have to be ready for anything.

One issue that Dish Network is very aware of is that consumers want to be able to purchase cable services on an individual basis rather than just package deals. While this concept does make sense to Dish Network their hands are tied on the issue because the programmers simply won't agree to it.

Mergers are another area of concern. While there was a deal on the table in the past few years for Dish Network to merge with DirecTV it did not go through. Such a merger was considered to help them compete with the larger cable companies out there. In the mean time Dish Network is content to continue growing their company on their own merit.

The CEO of Dish Network is very proud of the accomplishments that have taken place over the past ten years. He is also very happy with the growth the company has experienced. While he admits it has been a challenge at times, it is still fun and he looks forward to what the future has to hold for Dish Network. Over the past decade Dish Network has grown from 2,000 employees to over 20,000. They continue to improve their services and look for advantages over their competition.