OTTAWA – Bell Canada Enterprises’; $685 million divestiture of control of media company Bell Globemedia has been approved by the CRTC.
BGM is 68.5% controlled by BCE, with the rest owned by Thomson Family company Woodbridge Inc. The proposed new structure, announced in December, will see BCE sell all but 20% of its position in the company to the Ontario Teachers Pension Plan (which will hold 20%), Torstar Inc. (20%) and Woodbridge (boosting its holdings to 40%).
However, all involved parties are awaiting a decision by the Competition Bureau as well, so the date of final closing has not…
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VANCOUVER – Canadian production company Shavick Entertainment has purchased gay and lesbian digital specialty service OUTtv, but the release touting the sale has a key fact wrong.
The purchase price was not announced and the deal is subject to CRTC approval. This is the second time the category one digi-net launched in 2001 has been sold. The service has had its problems.
It was originally launched and owned by Score Media and named Pridevision. It aired a variety of gay and lesbian programming as well as many hours of adult content late at night. The adult content scared some…
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GATINEAU – Rogers Cable has asked the CRTC to add two Arabic channels to the list of eligible foreign satellite services that can be carried in Canada on a digital basis.
The cableco wants to be able to carry Al Arabiya, a 24-hour “niche news service” based in the Middle East, carrying news and current affairs programming from the region and the world. It broadcasts primarily in Arabic and offers content from news, documentary, lifestyle and human interest, business, and sports. It also wants to carry MBC Channel (America), which it describes as “a general interest service offering programming…
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OTTAWA – Bell Globemedia’s $1.7 billion offer to purchase CHUM Ltd. last Wednesday is sounding some alarm bells among producers and journalists, especially given CHUM’s layoff of 281 people also announced the same day.
Groups representing producers and journalists – and even one Toronto city council hopeful who was once a Citytv talking head – have sounded notes of caution but – perhaps encouraging for BGM – they have not come out against the deal.
"This is a major transaction which could signal a major restructuring of the Canadian broadcasting environment," said Guy Mayson, president and CEO,…
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GATINEAU – A Télé-Québec public affairs show was not racist when it broadcast episodes critical of Islam, the CRTC has found.
The commission received complaints from some viewers who were offended that Benoit Dutrizac, co-host of the program Les Francs-tireurs, said that Islam was a “stupid religion” for requiring children to fast. In another episode, he said that he was “pissed off” by Muslim students at a Montreal school who filed a million-dollar lawsuit against the school after it refused to provide them with areas for prayer and other religious practices.
The Centre for Research-Action on Race Relations said…
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GATINEAU – The CRTC has approved requests to show VOD and PPV programs that include commercials if they were already aired on Canadian TV and the show is offered for free to subscribers.
The commission will amend the licence for the Bell ExpressVu’s Vu! on-demand and pay-per-view services, and Cogeco’s VOD service, to allow this limited use of advertising.
Bell ExpressVu said the amendment would allow it to compete equally with other Canadian VOD services and evolving PPV media. Cogeco said it would be in the public interest.
Rogers Cable supported the move in its intervention to the commission,…
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GATINEAU – The CRTC is calling for applications for new radio stations in Sydney, N.S. and Sudbury, Ont.
The commission has received an application for a commercial station in Sudbury, as well as one in Sydney, and invites other broadcasters to apply before Sept. 15, in both cases.
While the CRTC has made public financial information on the Sudbury radio market, there aren’t enough stations in Sydney to allow the release, for confidentiality purposes.
Applicants will have to fulfill the usual requirements, including technical specifications, demonstrated market demand and potential advertising revenues, and promises of Canadian talent…
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GATINEAU – The CRTC today announced it’s allowing RDI to increase its hourly advertising by up to 50%, amending its licence from a former maximum of eight minutes per hour, to a new maximum of 12 minutes.
The CBC applied for the RDI change, saying it would give the French-language information channel the same maximum as its English-language Newsworld service. The CBC also pointed out that most specialty channels can air up to 12 minutes of ads in each clock hour.
The proposal was opposed by private broadcasters, including TVA, Astral, Cogeco Radio-Télévision, and Corus, who were upset that…
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"REGULATORY APPROVAL" are the two stock words every media sale announcement made in Canada has attached to it. As in: "Agreement XYZ will close after the required regulatory approval."
Wednesday’s big buy is no different as it will have to pass under the Competition Bureau’s and CRTC’s magnifying glasses, smudged and cracked as they appear to be sometimes. In the official release, Bell Globemedia and CTV CEO Ivan Fecan said: "With regulatory approval, we intend to serve Canadian audiences with both CTV and Citytv stations."
This time, though, that particular sentence means regulatory approval will only be able to come…
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MONTREAL and TORONTO – Today’s announcement that Astral Media and Corus Entertainment will together buy the 20% of Teletoon/Télétoon they don’t own from Cookie Jar Group (formerly Cinar) puts a value on the cartoon channel at $480 million.
The transaction, which is subject to the approval of the CRTC, will give Astral Media and Corus Entertainment each an additional 10% ownership of Teletoon, bringing their individual ownership to 50% each. The acquisition price for the 20% stake in the network is approximately $96 million.
Multiply times five and you get $480 million.
www.teletoon.com
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