Michele Schofield Director, Content – Programming, Acquisitions & Production, AETN All Asia Networks AETN All Asia Networks will be represented at MIPCOM 2008 by Michele Schofield, director, content and Sarah Kwek, manager, program acquisitions – both oversee acquisitions for South East Asia for: The History Channel, Crime & Investigation Network and The Biography Channel. We have a primary focus to acquire Asian factual stories. Within that genre the human-led stories have worked well. The male-skewing audience of The History Channel also takes an interest in military history, ancient history and history as it is discovered with a host. In acquiring for Crime & Investigation Network, it also must be factual. Storytelling of real crime investigations detailing the crimes & criminals, the victims, and the pieces of the puzzle that led to solving the case, work very well. Other programs which give our female-skewed audience an insight into the psychology of the killers is also of interest. Series (1 hours) are preferred or one-offs about a well-known case are also considered. The lighter side of law enforcement such as customs, parking, small claims etc are also being explored. The Biography Channel is our newest channel to the market and offers the broadest range in content possibilities. We’re looking for biographies about Asian people, extraordinary stories of everyday people, to ob-docs where watching life happen is amusing and entertaining. Truong Kieu Nga Deputy Director, HTV Choice Center (HTVC) Ho Chi Minh City Television Cable operators often buy completed channels to put on their system. However, in order to have a difference, an abundance of the content, they also consider to build up their own channels. It’s not easy to have the programming for a new channel. Normally, the content providers like to sell their program for free TV so they can have many audiences and can get high copyright fee. The second run is for cable. The characteristic of cable program is rerun, and drama in series is a good choice. The truth is that in the initial time, cable operators have to invest a lot of money in infrastructure. So the budget for content must be smaller. But the cable business is a long-term business. The content providers can support new cable operator with reasonable fees. And then, when the subscribers are increasing, it could bring mutual benefit. Wang Peijie Vice Chief Supervisor, JiangSu Broadcasting Corporation Some drama series that Jiangsu Satellite Channel acquired has rated well this year. Unlike the cases in other countries, many TV stations in China are both content producers and broadcasters. In fact, the contents that Chinese satellite channels acquire are mainly dramas, and most satellite channels choose to produce routine and seasonal programs all by themselves. Only those channels lacking enough budget and capable producing teams will turn to production companies for routine and seasonal programs. Compared with leading TV stations in China, production companies can neither invest heavily for top-notch programs nor mobilize necessary resources to promote the contents they produce. At present, three categories of programs are rating well in the Chinese market. The first one is talk shows about the life experience and emotions of common people, such as In Life produced and broadcast by Jiangsu Satellite Channel. The second category is entertainment shows such as Happy Show broadcast by Hunan Satellite Channel. The third category is seasonal reality shows, such as singing, dancing and magic contests among common people or stars. Actually, through there is still market demand for reality shows, and the rating is high, it is really hard to reality shows to develop further due to newly released policies. Todd Lituchy President, Entertainment, STAR STAR will be attending MIPCOM. We will have executives scouting for finished product for many of our channels, including Star World, Channel [V], and Xing Kong. We will also be scouting for formats to localize across our footprint. On Star World, Heroes and American Idol have performed very well for us this past year. Xing Kong and Star Chinese Channel have been quite successful with Japanese animation. America’s Next Top Model is the top acquired series for Channel [V]. As far as market trends, there seems to be more and more series about young adults’ lives that would work well for Channel [V]. This MIPCOM, we are looking for family shows for Xing Kong and first run/exclusive series for Star World, specifically comedies and family friendly reality programming. For Channel [V] we are looking for young-skewing, fresh concepts that can play across a variety of platforms including TV, online and mobile so that viewers can see the programs anytime, anywhere. Joy Olby-Tan VP, Acquisitions, Network Programming and Promotions, MediaCorp TV Channel 5 Blockbuster movies have always been a pillar of Channel 5’s schedule and this year, we made a concerted effort to show them in true HD. These lived up to viewership expectations and were seen in gloriously enhanced picture and sound. This was also the year where we were able to air movie trilogies consecutively as rights became available for us to do so: viewers enjoyed evergreen franchises such as Indiana Jones and Lord of the Rings. Soon, the entire Star Wars movie franchise plus the new Clone Wars the animated series and Harry Potter will be aired. On the non-scripted series front, Don’t Forget the Lyrics launched to promising numbers with favourites such as American Idol still pulling in the crowd. Reality as a genre is now a firm staple in the schedule. It would be interesting to see what new reality ‘genres’ will do well: the new ‘Eastern-inspired’ formats like Wipeout; I Survived a Japanese Gameshow; Hole in the Wall seem to be all the rage now so I would like to see these work in Singapore too. This was however a ‘strange’ year for scripted series. While the US Networks were reeling from the after-effects of the Writer’s Strike, we were facing shorter series runs with limited halo publicity from the US. Coupled with this content crunch, we are also finding that the Singaporean viewer is increasingly dividing his time between FTA TV and a host of competing activities. Maria Brown Managing Director, Acquisitions & Programming, Asian Food Channel Asian Food Channel will be attending MIPCOM 2008. We are a niche channel with a specific focus on food and as such have found that our viewers look to us to provide them with a wide variety of programs within our niche. Not surprisingly, as a channel based in Asia, some of our more popular programs tend to be ones that were produced in the region. Again, being a niche channel, it allows us to focus on the best of our niche. We are always looking to showcase the best food programming from our region and around the world. That said, we are always looking for programs that are driven by strong personalities. We are also looking for programming that showcases healthy eating. We have seen a number of programs that are close to what we are looking for but either feature too much fitness content and not enough food or are simply too Western to be relevant to our viewers. Shalini Behl VP Head of Programming, Reliance Capital In India, Reliance Big TV is the first to bring high definition to the country and our endeavor is to provide compelling content in all genres ranging from factual to fiction, sports to movies, lifestyle to documentary. Leading HD content partners have joined hands to be a part of this revolution and we will be looking to broaden our search for HD programming in the entertainment arena hopefully at MIPCOM this year. Rahadi Arsyad CEO and President Director, PT. Indonusa Telemedia (TelkomVision) At the moment, we are focusing on developing local content for our own in house channel but we are also open for new and fresh programmes or channels on Family entertainment. Our satellite platform is remarkably performing well with our current packaging sold through a very innovative way, the use of pre-paid television vouchers and as the target market is sub-urban, movies, such as HBO and Star Movies and sports dominate the take up. On the part of sports, we acquired rights of Liga Italia Serie A and Coppa Italia. We are in the midst of acquiring a number of other sports rights to enhance our own in house channels called TelkomVision Dua, a Sports & Entertainment Channel. For the entertainment part, all the programmes are local and we are working together with local production houses. We are launching IPTV by 4th quarter of this year. IPTV’s target market is urban and so the selection of channels is different and more comprehensive. We are launching with 60 channels and we plan to add more in house channels based on the needs of the viewers. To be sure, we will come up with our own local content. On the part of foreign programmes, by middle of next year, we would know what genre to buy in the market. With three platforms, cable, satellite and IPTV, we give our subscribers the option to avail of our services depending on their needs, locations and choices.