Boxer TV, the 50/50 venture between Dennis O’Brien’s Communicorp and Sweden’s Boxer TV-Access BV have been awarded the licence in principle to operate Ireland’s three national Digital Terrestrial Television multiplexes.

Boxer already operate DTT in Sweden, not without controversy, while Communicorp are traditionally a radio group owing Dublin’s 98, Spin 1038 and Newstalk among other stations in Ireland and across Europe.

Perhaps it’s not surprising then that Boxer intend to offer radio as a key part of their packages with their application stating “for the first time providing national reach for many local stations”.]

On the TV programming side, their basic package will include RTE, TV3, TG4, BBC, UTV, C4, Discovery, Eurosport and BBC News 24 for €9.99 a month. A further €23 pm gets you 11 extra channels including and interesting concept, BBC Ireland and ITV Ireland. These are compilations of the BBC 3&4 services and ITV 2, 3 & 4 services especially for the Irish market. Like many Sky options, the set-top box will be free when you subscribe.

However unlike Sky, if you’re a fan of HD, you’ll have to wait. No immediate plans from Boxer.

Following the successful conclusion of contract negotiations with the BCI, Boxer expect to be on-air mid-2009 with 200,000 subscribers by 2012 by which time they estimate they’ll have reached break-even stage.

Boxers full application can be found at www.bci.ie