Middle Eastern TV Expanding Platforms.

Sat TV services flooding the market with niche and general channels

The television scenario in the Middle East appears to be reaching a new phase: an expansion of digital platform technology and transmissions of global broadcasts. Since 1995, four digital satellite pay TV channels have become the major outlets throughout the Gulf region, along with analog free-to-air satellite channels. The four digital TV platforms -- Orbit, Gulf DTH/Showtime, ART/1st and Star Select -- are increasingly competing for viewership and sparking the appetite of the Middle East audience who, due to weather conditions and almost no movie theaters, often prefer to stay home to watch television. Both News Corp.'s Star Select (launched in 1996) and Gulf/DTH, co-financed by Kuwait Investment Projects (KIPCO) and aligned with Nilesat and Showtime, have cultivated an international English-Arabic base in the Gulf region, which has a large expatriate community. The three private satellite systems, MBC (Middle East Broadcasting Center), ART (Arab Radio and Television) and Orbit have developed specialized ni ches in Arabic broadcasting.

"Arabic audiences are becoming accustomed to our programming (much like in South America) through specialized soap operas and cultural shows bought from Arabic TV networks and by developing new programs," said Usama El-Sheikh, General Manager of the Arab Media Corporation in Cairo. "TV markets provide the arena to buy programming and also to expand the potential of selling." The virtual explosion of satellite television media in the Middle East, according to some analysts, can be traced to the late 1980s when newspapers Al-Sharq Al Awart and the Al-Hayat were transmitted via satellite from London to the Arab world, creating a pan-Arabic audience. Satellite TV made its initial impact during the 1990 Gulf War with CNN (linked with CNE -- Cable Network Egypt). Since then, there has been no looking back on the Middle East TV ever-expanding scenario.

"MBC has achieved major shares and attracted advertising in the eastern Saudi Arabia and Bahrain markets competing against the national station, ESN, and its two pan-Arabic rivals, ART and Orbit," commented MBC Chairman Ian Ritchie. "Since MBC is transmitted and mostly produced from London, there is an interesting blend of British and Arabic talent and administration."

MBC is owned by Saudi businessman Sheik Walid Ibrahimi. Competitor ART was founded by Saudi entrepreneur Sheik Saleh Kamel, one of the MBC's original partners. ART began transmission in 1994 from Fucino, Italy (near Rome) via Arabsat with four channels and has grown to become a global entertainment platform with more than 20 channels and plans for expansion with 18 more channels. ART'S tremendous reach is, in many ways, aided by its dynamic partner Prince al-Waleed bin Talal, whose companies span the globe and include Euro Disney, Citi Corp and New York's Plaza Hotel.

By targeting bilingual Arabs and transnational Arabs, the media ad revenues have dramatically increased. According to statistics, in 1994 ad revenue was $900 million for the whole Arab world as compared to $800 million ad revenue in Israel alone. Between 1995 and 1997, there was a 36 percent increase in revenue ($1.13 billion in 1995 and $1.54 billion in 1997). Currently Orbit, presided by CEO Alexander Zilo, is leading the market in Middle Eastern digital television broadcasting by transmitting 13 digital TV channels and more than 25 digital audio channels uplinked from Rome. Orbit's DTH platform launch in 1999 was the world's first digital system. Investment from the Saudi Arabian al-Mawared group has helped Orbit to expand, renting studio space in 1998 to Egypt's Media Production City in order to develop more local production.

Geography plays a big part in Mid-East television. According to a study by the Transnational Broadcast Studies, "the geographic factor in the Middle East from the pattern of construction in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf is that of low-skyline horizontal expansion in the desert terrain -- while in Egypt, this geography is not a factor with Greater Cairo containing more than a third of Egypt's 50 million population." This pattern translates to TV subscriptions in Jordan and Egypt and dishes in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the Emirates. Egypt is to Middle East TV what Miami is to Latin American television -- a global gateway for programming and language with common colloquial Arabic.

Since Egypt is a leading film and television producer with fewer content restrictions, its reach is constantly spread. Egypt's launch of Nilesat in 1998 provided up to 96 television channels across the Gulf and parts of Europe and Africa.

"We are seeing a desire to specialize our news and dramatic programming for the Arab world" said Nile Thematic Channels Current Events Coordinator Mohammed Abdel-metal. "We are attending TV trade shows such as Monte Carlo and MIP-TV and marketing our own programming, now that Egyptian history is made more popular with live tomb-opening programs shown on Discovery and Fox TV."

Various National Arab stations such as Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, Kuwait, Jordan, Oman, Qatar and the Gulf Emirates are also vigorously launching new channels to challenge satellite programming. In addition, the alternative Multichannel Multipoint Distribution Service (MMDS) has been established in countries such as Saudi Arabia and Qatar to scramble politically and culturally unacceptable programs. It is said to be working in a state of coexistence with DTH in much of the Gulf and in Jordan with a common interpretation of Islamic sensibilities.

Territorial gains in geographic boundaries of the Middle East, according to analysts, have contributed to "Super Stations" such as MBC and Lebanon's LBC and have provided rival platforms to encourage fresh programming.

A continual east/west adjustment in the Islamic culture and a growing viewership is indeed formulating a "middle ground" for the appropriately named Middle East which, in turn, is furthering platforms for Middle Eastern broadcasting.