News

Eutelsat: 4K UHD innovation leader

Advanced Television talks to Marcus Fritz of Eutelsat about their commitment to 4K UHD and their enthusiasm for sharing their experience with broadcasters, content producers and pre and post production.

Eurosport Acquires Four-Property Rugby League Package Including Rights to European Super League, to be Broadcast on Setanta Sports Asia

Singapore/Paris, August 24, 2015 – Eurosport, a Discovery company and home to the greatest selection of live sports moments, has secured the exclusive TV and digital rights from Sky plc for a selection of Rugby League properties to be broadcast on Discovery’s recently acquired premium rugby channel, Setanta Sports Asia. The rights are effective immediately until the end of the 2019 season.

Peter Hutton, Chief Executive Officer, Eurosport said: “It is important that all forms of the game are shown on Setanta Sports Asia, demonstrating our ambition to remain the leading rugby broadcaster in Asia. As a big fan of Rugby League myself, I’m thrilled that Setanta Sports Asia now has the sport’s leading leagues and competitions in the world delivering some of the most exciting rugby to a wide audience in Asia.”

Super League General Manager Blake Solly added: “We are delighted that sports fans across Asia will now have the opportunity to follow all the action from the First Utility Super League, Ladbrokes Challenge Cup and Kingston Press Championship, as well as the World Club Series, on Setanta Sports Asia.

“Rugby League has experienced significant global growth in the last few years and this partnership with Setanta Sports Asia will help us showcase the skill and athleticism of some of the world’s most exciting sportsmen to a massive audience. I am sure that TV viewers on Setanta Sports Asia will not fail to be impressed by the high quality of the coverage that Rugby League fans in Europe already enjoy,” concluded Solly.

Rugby League properties include:
• European Super League: the top-level Rugby League club competition in Europe.
• Championship: the UK’s second-tier Rugby League competition.
• Challenge Cup: the international knockout Rugby League cup competition. Hull Kingston Rovers will battle it out against the Leeds Rhinos in the 2015 final on 29th August.
• World Club Challenge: the annual Rugby League competition played between the top three clubs of the Australian National Rugby League (NRL) and European Super League. Only matches played in the UK will be shown.
• Two magazine shows produced by Sky Sports, ‘Full Time’ and ‘Boots n’ all’ featuring match previews and insightful analysis along with interviews with some of the biggest names in the game.

This great new rugby content joins the wealth of top class rugby that already exists on the Setanta Asia channel. For Rugby League fans the channel has exclusive rights to the NRL including The State of Origin games. For Rugby Union fans Setanta Asia is the home of Super Rugby, European Rugby Champions Cup, Aviva Premiership, Currie Cup, Guinness Pro 12, The Rugby Championship and lots more.

Next European Super League matches to be shown live on Setanta Asia:

Thursday 3 Sep Huddersfield v Castleford
Friday 4 Sep Leeds v St Helens
Thursday 10 Sep Castleford v St Helens
Friday 11 Sep Wigan v Hull
Thursday 17 Sep Leeds v Castleford
Friday 18 Sep St Helens v Wigan

ENDS

Eurosport Acquires Four-Property Rugby League Package Including Rights to European Super League, to be Broadcast on Setanta Sports Asia

Next European Super League matches to be shown live on Setanta Asia:

ENDS

21 August, 2015

Welcome to News Views, CASBAA’s news round-up culled from sources across the industry for the week ending Aug 21st. Curated by CASBAA, News Views keeps you in the loop. We always value your feedback, so tell us what you think!

Brought to you by:

Christopher Slaughter CEO	In the US, Comcast is reportedly planning to launch an ad-supported streaming service called “Watchable” that will feature short-form video and offer content-makers a much more generous ad-revenue split than platforms like YouTube. The service seems to be aimed squarely at millennials, and will leverage the investments Comcast-owned NBCU has been making in various online media companies — by the way, last week’s rumor about a US$200 million investment in Buzzfeed has been confirmed. The Watchable news is not without its detractors, and even the less cynical commentators are sneering at it as “a defensive move.” Then again, there are still plenty of people sneering at Buzzfeed, and surely Watchable has to be a better strategic move than leaving all those massively viral (and NBCU-funded) Jimmy Fallon clips unmonetised on YouTube?
John Medeiros Chief Policy Officer	“Waving the bloody shirt” is a one of those wonderfully descriptive political metaphors (“used to define someone who brings up a past injustice or mistreatment … to cover up an injustice being committed in the present.”) And it well describes how “copyleft” forces in the USA wave the specter of the now-dead SOPA copyright law to scare people about ongoing copyright enforcement. The latest case started with the Silicon Valley-funded Electronic Frontier Foundation denouncing MPAA litigation against piracy website Movietube (seeking cessation of services to the pirates by third-party web providers). This gave rise to a very on-point commentary comparing EFF to Monty Python’s Knights Who Say Ni. “The Web industry likes to portray every prospect of this type of legal action…as the beginning of the end. They say SOPA, and hope the peasants cringe.” Another commentator apparently told the EFF in so many words to shut up about SOPA, already. But then in a more serious development, a coalition of Internet companies filed a brief in the Movietube case, again waving the bloody SOPA shirt. We’ll see if the court agrees, in due course, that “what is abusive is the way online piracy (for profit) is allowed to flourish, made sacrosanct by tech apologists.”
Mark Lay Vice President, Singapore	When an industry veteran does a keynote speech, it is usually well thought out and hits the key issues and threats facing that particular business. The recent speech by Robert Thomson (Chief Executive of News Corp) at the 2015 Lowy Institute Media Awards dinner hits this mark. His comments about the state of the media business in general are poignant, “Media companies, too, are looking for their bearings. Here we are in the age of the GPS, of relentless, endless tracking and precisely precise data, and yet some in media are wandering aimlessly, dazed and confused, without coordinates and slouching towards oblivion.” He also doesn’t hold back on his distaste for Google, Facebook or Linkedin, “…there are broader issues that are still unfolding for media companies, who are themselves struggling to profit from their news and other content, while the distributionists are helping themselves to that content, coopting and corralling audiences and consciously devaluing brands.”
Anjan Mitra Executive Director, India	Problem with crowd sourcing is that it can get unmanageable. And India’s Department of Telecoms (DoT) may just realise that when it collates public response to its report on OTT and net neutrality. Differentiating the serious from non-serious from amongst over 70,000 responses would be mind-boggling. General responses like `I want to access everything on the Internet‘ (difference between legal and illegal content hasn’t dawned on such respondents yet) can submerge serious submissions from the likes of CASBAA. Telecoms Minister did put up a weak defence , but tech-savvy Narendra Modi-led government seemingly is unable to map the big picture where Indian players are saying entertainment’s future is OTT and traditional media companies are exploring digital play.
Christopher Slaughter CEO	EzyFlix has become the first casualty in Australia’s streaming media sector since Netflix arrived Down Under. It’s not like the company didn’t see it coming; just last December, an EzyFlix co-founder predicted “carnage” in the market. Netflix has seen steady subscriber growth since its launch in Australia, and the battle for streaming subscribers has only just begun.
Mark Lay Vice President, Singapore	This week, the “too much good TV” meme was trending again, as the TCA summer tour wound down. Whether the “New Golden Age” is actually “Peak TV” is open to debate; and make no mistake, debate it critics did. For that matter, just as they did back in 2014, as they also did as long ago as 2013, and as they even did way back in 2011. Hmmm… now who’s complaining about all those remakes?
John Medeiros Chief Policy Officer	Indian broadcasters turned out recently to criticize a TRAI mandate that commercial subscribers should receive cable TV for the same price paid by poor households. IBF President Uday Shankar and others criticized the principle of “five star hotels availing TV content at subsidised rates especially when they charge a leg and arm for a room, a meal or even a bottle of water.”
Kevin Jennings Programme Director	Apple’s new TV streaming service won’t launch this year as originally planned. Apple had wanted to introduce a live TV service delivered via the Internet by June this year , but is now aiming for 2016. A report from Bloomberg suggested that licensing from TV networks is taking longer than expected, while other sources claimed the delay might be more related to Apple software integration.
Christopher Slaughter CEO	Fox Networks is experimenting with a new advertising model for its US mobile and online video service: letting Fox Now viewers watch one 60-second ad before episodes of “Master Chef Junior”. The trial is a result of two converging trends, namely, low CPM rates for online ads, and the increasing use of ad-blocking software among online viewers who hate ads. Publishers may have only themselves to blame for the latter problem, but if the Fox Now experiment can solve the former, look for it to be replicated elsewhere online.
John Medeiros Chief Policy Officer	Alert from Dubai, where it seems a court convicted and fined the distributor of one of those black-box streaming media services for UK expats. Copyright concerns aside, the court noted this was an unlicensed broadcasting service. Such legal reasoning should be applied in Asia as well.
	It’s not definitive yet and early, but worth taking note of: creeping fear of government censorship of media. Corporate rumblings, including those in media, have started against slow pace of economic reforms. And, despite the PM’s whirlwind global tour assuring India is a great place for investments where democratic rights are upheld, global media is sceptical.
Jane Buckthought Advertising Consultant	Television is crucial to consumer engagement but it is currently in an evolutionary period which could last up to five years and which will redefine how consumers and agencies interact with it. Changing technology and addressable screens are important developments.

Some additional links you might be interested in:

Member News

CNN Indonesia starts broadcasting from new Jakarta centre

CNN Indonesia has started broadcasting from its new Transmedia broadcast centre in Jakarta.

The new unit offers a mix of national and international news, plus the latest in business and sport in Bahasa Indonesia.

The start of CNN Indonesia TV follows the launch of CNNIndonesia.com in October last year.

Skyworth Joins AAPA Affirms Piracy Stance

SHENZHEN, CHN: Shenzhen Skyworth Digital Technology, a global provider of smart home solutions and the world’s fourth largest set-top box manufacturer, has become a member of the Audiovisual Anti-Piracy Alliance (AAPA).

AAPA represents companies involved in the provision of protected audiovisual services, security technology for such services, and the manufacturing of products which facilitate the delivery of such services. AAPA’s mission is to support the fight against piracy where this involves the development, promotion, distribution, application or use of technologies resulting in the unauthorized use of protected audiovisual content, by coordinating intelligence and action supported by effective legislation and its implementation.

PwC: Media Deal Values Nearly Double in Q2

Entertainment, Media and Communications sector deal values nearly doubled in the second quarter to $76 billion from $39 billion in the prior period, according to a report by PricewaterhouseCoopers, driven by transformative deals in the Cable ($63 billion), Internet & Information ($6 billion) and Communications ($3 billion) spaces.

beIN Sports extends European football across the US

beIN Sports has renewed its exclusive broadcast rights for three of the top football leagues in the world – Spain’s La Liga, Italy’s Serie A and France’s Ligue 1 – and will deliver them across the US from the 2015-2016 season.

A+E restructures international division

A+E Networks’ international marketing team is adding three new positions, and the team will be realigned to support specific brands and genres across all territories.

“We are raising the international profile of our channel brands and continuing to expand A+E Networks’ business in new and existing territories,” said Amanda Hill, chief creative officer of international at A+E Networks. “These moves help position our team to bring unified, best in class strategies to our markets, ensuring global impact as well as a more customized local relevance.”

FOX International Channels Asia Renews Focus on North Asia Business, Realigns Executive Team

AUGUST 21, 2015 – HONG KONG – FOX International Channels (FIC) announced today that it will renew its focus on Japan and Korea to capitalize on emerging opportunities in these markets. Additionally the company will ramp up its investment in production of Chinese content, with a particular focus on mainland China. As a result, the senior management team overseeing North and Southeast Asia will be restructured effective September 1st to best align with these objectives.

Joon Lee will move into a new role focused on driving growth initiatives in Japan and Korea as well as increasing FIC’s share of the growing opportunities in original Chinese production as Executive Vice President, North Asia & Head of Original Productions – Mainland China.

Simeon Dawes will take on the additional territory of Hong Kong & Southeast Asia where he will be responsible for the region’s P&L. He will continue to oversee FIC’s Middle East business as well as ad sales across Asia Pacific. His title will be Executive Vice President – Advertising Sales & Partnerships, and Managing Director – Hong Kong, Southeast Asia & Middle East.

Keertan Adyanthaya takes on the role of Executive Vice President, Content & Communications – Hong Kong & Southeast Asia. He will be responsible for all content, channel operations and marketing for the region covering the Hollywood and Chinese entertainment, and factual genres.

Rohit D’Silva continues in his role as Executive Vice President, Commercial and Sports, overseeing the FOX Sports Asia business and leading affiliate and content partnerships as well as non-linear products.

Commenting on the executive team changes, Zubin Gandevia, President of FIC Asia Pacific & Middle East, said, “Japan and Korea are two of the biggest media markets in our footprint. In view of recent strategic partnerships we’ve forged in both countries, including with JTBC to launch JTBC3 FOX Sports in Korea and with Avex in Japan as part of an OTT offering, we see massive potential for further growth in these markets. Joon’s unique combination of experience – his familiarity with our businesses in both countries plus his proven leadership and creativity – will be invaluable in helping us to dive deeper in these markets.”

He continues, “Keertan’s proven successes with content-driven initiatives will complement Simeon and Rohit’s ability to forge mutually beneficial partnerships with our advertisers and platform partners. All four executives are proven leaders in FIC and will without a doubt propel our businesses in North and Southeast Asia to new heights.”

-END-

About FOX International Channels
FOX International Channels (FIC) is 21st Century FOX’s international multi-media business. We develop, produce and distribute 300+ wholly- and majority-owned entertainment, sports, factual and movie channels in 45 languages across Latin America, Europe, Asia and Africa. FIC’s core channel brands include FOX, FOX Sports, FOX Life, FOX+ and National Geographic Channel. FIC’s movie channels include FOX Movies, FOX Movies Premium and SCM (formerly Star Chinese Movies). Our non-linear brands include FOX Play, FOX Play+ and Nat Geo Play. These networks and their related mobile, non-linear and high- definition extensions, reach over 1.8 billion cumulative households worldwide. In addition, FIC owns and operates two production studios and produces thousands of local programming hours for its wholly owned channels and third parties. In operation since: August 14, 1993.

For media inquiries, please contact:
Kelly Jang | Director, Marketing & Communications | FOX International Channels Asia | Email: kelly.jang@fox.com

Username
Password

	Remember Me Lost your password?

Christopher Slaughter

CEO

John Medeiros

Chief Policy Officer

Mark Lay

Vice President, Singapore

Anjan Mitra

Executive Director, India

Christopher Slaughter

CEO

Mark Lay

Vice President, Singapore

John Medeiros

Chief Policy Officer

Kevin Jennings

Programme Director

Christopher Slaughter

CEO

John Medeiros

Chief Policy Officer

Jane Buckthought

Advertising Consultant