UK: Disney Launches Digital FTA Channel

http://www.c21media.net/news/detail....&article=18490

Disney Freeview channel to focus on daytime

The Walt Disney Company is launching its long-awaited new free-to-air
channel on the UK's Freeview digital terrestrial platform on January 12, it
has been confirmed.

Initially shying away from primetime, the channel, which has a working title
of Daytime, will show comedies, made-for-TV movies and soaps, primarily from
the US.

But a Disney spokesman said it was too early to pin down specific details of
programming or whether they would show UK originated material.

"It would be premature to go into too much detail, but we can confirm that
we have a channel on the Freeview platform that will run primarily during
the daytime," he told C21.

The channel is the result of a carriage deal with Welsh DTT franchise SDN,
and is Disney's biggest foray into free-to-air television in the UK. It
already owns three branded children's pay channels on the Sky platform.

But the launch of Daytime adds to its UK interests, which also include a 25%
stake in the breakfast broadcaster GMTV, and is bound to fuel speculation of
its interest in acquiring more assets in the recently de-regulated British
TV sector.

Freeview, the fledgling free-to-air digital terrestrial platform backed by
the BBC and BSkyB, is seen as the logical way the UK broadcasting industry
will move into digital.

Following the failure of ITV Digital, the BBC and BSkyB agreed to work
together on the platform, alongside technology and transmission outfit Crown
Castle.

Although its capacity is severely limited compared to that of Sky (30
channels compared to well over 200), it is expected to be the platform of
choice for the majority of digital TV viewers, after analogue switch off.