History
Ahead of its launch, Pace supplied 75,000 set-top boxes for the provider in 1999.[2] Bezeq injected US$12 million in April 2000.[3] Poalim Communications owned 10% of the company.[4] The cable companies made their first retaliation against Yes in late December 1999: once the three companies were combined to form a larger group, the new group planned to introduce telephone service at lower prices than those practiced by Bezeq, as well as free internet access to kindergartens and schools.[5]
Yes began test broadcasting on 29 May 2000. The initial phase contained a 30-channel line-up, featuring Channel 1, Channel 2, Education 23, three in-house movie channels (Yes 1, Yes 2, Yes 3), Cartoon Network, Hallmark, TCM, CNN International, National Geographic Channel, Viva, VH1, BBC World, Sky News, BBC Prime, Eurosport, Channel 33, Fashion TV, MTV, foreign channels (one per language, in Arabic, Russian, French and German) and five radio stations. From July, the company would carry Channel 3, Channel 4, Channel 5 and Channel 6, the independent channels owned by the cable companies.[6] In June, the company was in breach of regulations regarding subscriber numbers during its trial phase, having a base of 3,000 subscribers, three times the number permitted by law (1,000).[7] Full broadcasting began in July 2000. At launch, the company priced its service at NIS 129 compared to NIS 159 for the cable companies.[8] The company's launch (and long-used) slogan was "Larger than life cinematic experience" (חוויה קולנועית גדולה מהחיים), which was mainly used as a key to lure subscribers to its offer of movie and TV series channels.[9]
On 17 August 2000, it launched Blue, its adult channel, following the launch of Playboy TV the previous week. The channel aired from 10pm to 4am (up to 5am on weekends), was encrypted and PIN-protected.[10] As of January 2001, it delivered 82 television channels. 20% of subscribers had access to all channels available. 30% of the subscriber base subscribed to add-on channels, Yes's in-house Briza channel was the most-subscribed.[11] By April, it had 130,000 subscribers and started offering decoders to new subscribers for free. Yes data on 21 April revealed that there were 2.2 decoders per subscriber. The goal was to reach 300,000 subscribers by the end of the year.[12] On 29 October 2001, it started carrying NBA TV.[13] May 2002 reports said that the average subscriber spent NIS 185 per month.[14] The company announced in February 2003 that, in case of the escalation of the war in Iraq, all of its kids and youth channels would be available free to all subscribers for an undetermined period of time.[15]
Yes adopted a new logo in late October 2004, replacing the existing slogan ("Larger than life cinematic experience") with "Say Yes", and replacing its dark blue logo featuring two crossed rings with a new circular logo using a variety of colors. Coinciding with this decision was its sponsorship of a themed festival, yesfesT.V., at the Hayarkon Park later that month (15 and 16 October), which featured promotional actions from some of its channels. In addition, with the rebrand, Yes planned to launch Yes Weekend, an entertainment channel featuring reality and drama series, as well as original productions such as The Yacht - Travel Diary, funded by Yes's parent company Bezeq. All of this came at a time when Hot lost subscribers and Yes gained a higher amount of new subscribers compared to those who left the competitor. In the first full year of the Hot brand, Hot lost 26,500 subscribers; Yes gained approximately 43,000.[17] The company announced at the very end of December 2004 that it would remove France 2 from its offer, which it justified as being "uneconomic" and that it had unresolved rights issues. The channel's office in Israel said that the reception of the channel was not scrambled in the Middle East and that it was open to new negotiations to restore the channel.[18]
On 18 November 2004, yes started offering its customers the first DVR in Israel, called yesMax (similar in function to the TiVo).[19] Yes Docu started broadcasting in June 2005, starting a conflict with Noga Communications-owned Channel 8, which was not part of CRSC negotiations to carry the channel on the provider.[20] On 6 September 2007, yes had its signals disrupted due to Israel's attack on a nuclear reactor in Syria. By mid-October, its signals were back in order[21] and gave its subscribers a three-month compensation period giving them access to every channel to recoup its losses, excluding the erotic channels and the DVDBOX VOD service.[22] HD services started on December 23, 2007, ahead of HOT; the company expected 10,000 subscribers by year-end 2008.[23]
Yes's earnings were negative between January and July 2010, but had improved by August. Key indicators included its ongoing support for the Israeli film industry as well as its leadership among the series channels.[9]
On 14 March 2019, Bezeq announced that it would discontinue satellite television services over a period of several years.[24]
Yes in August 2025 announced that it would continue operating a satellite service on the Dror 1 satellite built by IAI. Although it is a military satellite, it has capacity for civilian use. The provider grew its number of subscribers in 2023 (driven mostly by its fiber-based network) and announced the migration in accordance with the end of the contract with AMOS. 90% of the subscriber base is using Yes only for its internet-based services.[25][26]
