Since demitting office as Chairman of Cable & Wireless Jamaica Ltd (then known as Lime, now as FLOW) in 2015, Chris Dehring has gradually been preparing for a revolution in Caribbean media. Drawing on his extensive knowledge of system building, the Caribbean financial market and mindset, as well as – naturally – how the Caribbean population consumes media, Dehring is now well poised and “ready” to launch his READY TV pay-as-you-go cable concept in the Jamaican market.

With the name READY — an acronym for Rebellious, Energetic, Active, Determined and Yummy! – Dehring emphasises that the concept of this digital broadcast service is simple: “Think of pay as you go mobile phones; this is pay as you go wireless cable.”What? That’s correct. After completing their first round of financing in August 2016, Dehring and his Caribbean-anchored team have quietly been building a platform to support a fully wireless ‘cable’ TV network. “The phrase ‘wireless cable’ might not make sense as an oxymoron, but that’s exactly what it is”, chuckles Dehring.The impressive team behind the platform includes renowned career banker Peter Reid at the helm as Chairman, media mogul – better known as platinum-certified recording artiste Orville ‘Shaggy’ Burrell, and David Casanova, a man Dehring credits as the most technically savvy mobile network engineer in the entire Caribbean region.Over coffee at READY TV HQ, the unassuming plaza in Greater Portmore —- a location Dehring is proud to describe as the hub of his primary target market — decked out in what will soon be acknowledged as his signature purple-hued accessories, Dehring gives Sunday Finance an exclusive sneak preview of what READY TV will offer just ahead of launching the first commissioned tower that will serve the Portmore and Kingston areas.In the plaza there are signs of the signature READY TV purple – apparently a nod to marketing philosophies that indicate purple combines the passion of red with the stability of blue – increasingly permeating the exterior. This location houses the head office, the first retail store, and downstairs a wholesale outlet is to come to encourage enterprising independent retailers who wish to resell boxes and credit in their respective neighbourhoods.Energy levels are high as a slew of young executives buzz around quietly working in the mostly open-plan space, even though the full complement of custom-ordered furniture has still not yet arrived. In what feels like a friendly casual Silicon Valley-esque HQ, replete with stocked modern kitchen and framed inspirational artwork, Dehring demonstrates on a pair of impressively oversized Samsung televisions exactly what READY TV will do to change the face of the Jamaican media landscape.One television is connected to an old- fashioned “rabbit ears” antenna. The screen is a haze of snow with snippets of a highly pixellated football game coming through.“This is what most of Jamaica sees when they turn on their television sets,” says Dehring. “Of 880,000 households in Jamaica, only 250,000 have access to cable,” he notes, referring to traditional cable operator provider networks such as FLOW and Digicel. “But 800,000 of those households own a television set…so there is a disconnect in terms of accessibility within the marketplace.”Seated under a zinc roof lean-to on the grass, an assortment of ordinary Jamaicans – both children and adults – are watching TV In the yard. This ease and simplicity is exactly what Dehring and company have striven to achieve and offer to the general public: “…once you get your box and plug it in, you’re ready to go.” Unlike other subscription-based platforms such as Netflix that require a regular monthly payment and internet access via a service provider to access the application, READY TV’s network serves as its own wireless provider, allowing access to any READY box and antenna located anywhere.One of the big reveals from Dehring is that in addition to offering this ease of getting on a network “…no more waiting to schedule an appointment with a cable technician or hoping that cable comes to your area” , the means by which the public can access the platform is also just as simple and familiar to the market. “If it’s just one match, one stage show or one hour of a series, you can pay for that access only and top back up again as you want.”Another revealing piece of news is that the platform will also offer more than 10 channels free of charge, guaranteeing all box owners their own regularly accessible content without topping up.This seems a risky business decision for the operators; sure, consumers purchase a box that comes with an antenna and remote, but then what if they pay for only one programme ?“We are betting on human nature,” says Dehring, “With access this easy, people will return to the platform as needed.” The free channels include local favourites CVM TV, Business Access television and RETV.” Boxes will be easy to purchase via kiosks found in easy- to-reach locations such as supermarkets, and Dehring assures that READY TV credit will be as ubiquitous and easy to purchase as mobile phone credit already is today.“Jamaicans are incredibly creative people, and as it is now, budding filmmakers and media marketers are making incredible content that they are putting up for free on YouTube. This gives these creatives an opportunity to monetise the content that they are already making and are in need of an outlet for.”The quality of the feed is also part of the ground-breaking technological achievements.“We are leapfrogging from Standard Definition straight to High Definition TV,” Dehring proudly asserts. READY TV has spared no expense in building a state-of- the-art network that in many cases outperforms its counterparts in Europe in terms of the quality of the feed and the diversity of programming offered.“Combining both free on air channels with pay TV is also unique,” says Dehring who, on doing a comparison with similar services in Germany, boasts that the READY TV model is far ahead; “…Germany is just launching their wirelesss DVD T2 network now and are launching with 40 channels…READY will have twice that number.”Accolades have already started pouring in for the venture, as READY TV is featured in the latest edition of media industry bible TV Tech Global magazine. Having just returned from the National Association of Broadcasters convention in Las Vegas that saw the world’s leading media companies gather in one setting, Dehring acknowledges the attention that READY is already getting, highlighting the innovative step toward providing Jamaica with its first digital broadcast service.However, he is quick to point out that this concept is not designed to go head to head with “the big boys” of wired cable.“Most of our clientele are in areas where it financially doesn’t make sense to hardwire cable anyway, because of the population density in the area or complications with building out the infrastructure,” notes Dehring, who, while keeping mum on targets and specific timelines for the project, admits that the cost to build a wireless network has its advantages in terms of less infrastructural hardware susceptible to theft and disrepair.READY TV is set to launch in Kingston and Portmore in June, with a broader cross section of the island expected to receive coverage by December 2017. And where does READY TV see itself in five years? Dehring says, “Caribbean expansion is the long-term plan, but we want to focus on getting Jamaica right first, and in five years would be fully [accessible] islandwide.”