Digital TV Europe June 2011


CEE 2011 > Channels


While Poland is the keystone of its presence in the region, BBC Worldwide is beginning to strike deals elsewhere in central and eastern Europe for its portfolio, launching BBC Entertainment in Serbia, and is looking at other opportunities in the Balkan region. Other recent deals include the launch of the BBC HD channel on TTnet in Turkey (where it is already available on Turksat and DSmart). “HD is certainly interesting for the market – BBC Knowledge HD has worked well in Poland,” says McDonough. “It’s the most- watched channel on the ‘n’ platform.” While major players including BBC


Worldwide see central and eastern Europe as a market that offers strong growth (albeit increasingly challenging from a competitive standpoint), for single-channel provider KidsCo flexibility is the key to success. KidsCo originally launched in the CEE region because it identified a gap in the market. “Having got carriage quickly [when we launched] it’s been a bit slower than in the first two to three years,” says managing director Paul Robinson. However, while KidsCo has been focusing on making headway elsewhere of late (including western Europe), there are still a number of key operators to target in cen- tral and eastern Europe, including Cyfrowy Polsat and Cyfra Plus in Poland. The Baltic States and Bulgaria also remain KidsCo-free zones and Robinson believes there may be opportunities for distribution in both those territories. “The other part is Russia, where we now have licences and an agent,” he says. “We are now building our presence there, with Akado, Orion and some smaller operators, but there is a lot of potential. We have had to spend time investing in infrastructure and finding the right partner, but in the next year we will see good growth.” For more specialist content providers, the CEE region also remains a market character- ized by growth. Adult channel provider Marc Dorcel sees considerable opportunities in the region based on multiple revenue streams from linear channels, video-on-demand and magazines. “Historically, CEE has been a very segmented market, with many small-to-mid- dle sized analogue cable operators,” says CEO Gregory Dorcel. “Because of analogue switch- off, they will have to upgrade the networks and that requires huge investments. Quality adult content is a good way to recover these invest- ments as it drives a demanding audience ready to pay. And I do believe that we have the


Visit us at www.digitaltveurope.net 13


most complete and comprehensive offer on the market today.” The company’s content is, says Dorcel, present on many of the major platforms in the region and it is now focusing on smaller regional platforms and on selling video-on-demand, as well as being present at trade shows including PIKE (Poland) and Tihany (Hungary). “Any country is interesting for us. Our only limit, which we have every- where, is the legal framework for adult con- tent distribution,” says Dorcel.


One channel provider with a strong her- itage in the region is Chello Zone, the interna- tional channels arm of Liberty Global’s Chellomedia unit. Chello Zone operates 13 channels: Zone Reality, Zone Romantica, Extreme Sports Channel, JimJam, Food Network, Fine Living Network, Fantasy Channel and (the latest addition to the stable) The Outdoor Channel. The division is focus- ing on developing its existing brands as well as the launch of Food Network and Outdoor Channel, both of which are available in HD versions. Chello Zone also recently teamed up with Polsat in Poland to launch JimJam Polsat, a dedicated Polish kids channel. The Outdoor Channel is currently available in Russia. “Well positioned channels, with a core target audi- ence and a potentially commercial audience are important for operators, especially as they are looking for a strong driver content for new SD packaging, VOD offerings and HD pack- aging,” says Louise Cottrell, vice-president,


chasing power in the region clearly has a long way to go before it catches up on the West, the strong growth profile of the region makes it attractive. Davidson says that AETN has sold History across the region and penetration is growing. More recently, the channel provider has pushed its Crime & Investigation channel into new territories across CEE, including Poland, Bulgaria, Serbia and Croatia. “Getting that out into the rest of the territories s a key goal, and in the longer term we are looking to get Bio and Military History into that market too,” says Davidson. He says AETN benefits from Crime & Investigation belonging to a completely different genre of channels than History – allowing it to present it to distribu- tion partners in a different way. “It’s complete- ly different which allows us to access a very different audience,” he says.


Local production


In addition to building an advertising busi- ness in key markets such as Poland, Davidson says that local content will be key to the chan- nels’ success. “The next step is local produc- tion and we have started talking to local pro- ducers both for History and C&I,” he says. This will enable the channel provider to become more relevant to its distribution part- ners and to build an audience for advertising too. He says that the obvious first step is to


“Quality adult content is a good way to recover these investments as it drives a demanding audience ready to pay.”


Gregory Dorcel, Dorcel


affiliate sales at Chello Zone. Outdoor Channel is therefore a good solution for plat- forms and has an important role in helping operators build additional revenue opportuni- ties.” Cottrell says another channel in the port- folio may be available in HD later this year. Central and eastern Europe as a whole is seen as “a very significant market” by Tom Davidson, managing director of AETN UK, the US channel provider’s joint venture with BSkyB, which distributes a range of brands including History, Crime & Investigation and Bio in the CEE region. While consumer pur-


take formats that have worked well elsewhere (such as the group’s American Restoration and Pawn Starsproperties) and produce local variants. “The other thing we see potential for is topics that have not really been touched on with real PR value in those territories,” says Davidson. “The feedback we get is that there are topics that people have an interest in cov- ering but lack the money. There seems to be more opportunity in the CEE market because the local production industry doesn’t have the money to take those shows.”


While local production is something that


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28