The Czech television market is preparing for the arrival of a new sports channel from the commercial Prima Group. This comes at a time when the battle for public service media – which includes the free-to-air sports channel ČT sport – is in full swing.
The acquisition of Sporty TV and an easy route to viewers
Prima Sport is not expected to start entirely from scratch, but would be acquired by the commercial group as part of the takeover of Sporty TV. From a media market perspective, such a move makes sense. As a result, the smaller sports television channel will gain the strong backing of a major broadcasting group, and even if it has minimal new content in the early stages, it will be able to market itself much more effectively to viewers and advertisers as a strong and established brand. Furthermore, both Sporty TV and Prima are DVB-T2 customers of České Radiokomunikace.
Looking back, we might recall , for example, Fanda TV (now Nova Action), which originally positioned its programming as a combination of entertainment for men (including adult content) and attractive sports coverage in a widely accessible format. However, this channel gradually moved away from this profile, particularly in light of changes in the media market. Sports rights became the exclusive domain of the premium pay-TV channels Nova Sport.
Slovak Sport, Sport 5 and O2TV Free
Attempts to operate purely sports-based or narrowly specialised channels via free-to-air digital terrestrial broadcasting have a long history in the Czech Republic, dating back as far as the era of analogue television, if we are to include TV Galaxie. Take, for example, Slovak Sport, which, with unclear funding behind it, attempted to break into the market with the rights to the English Premier League. Nor did the Sport 5 channel succeed, despite having been led in the past by the experienced manager Jiří Hojgr, who eventually left the channel.
It is worth noting that O2TV (now Oneplay) also dabbled in terrestrial TV. In March 2017, the O2TV Free channel was launched in SD resolution on DVB-T multiplex 4 (now DVB-T2 multiplex 24). The project served as a promotion for O2’s premium content and combined free-to-air TV with HbbTV. From today’s perspective, it is somewhat paradoxical that the service also operated via Prima’s HbbTV. Viewers could pay for 24-hour access to the then-available channels O2TV Sport, O2TV Fotbal and O2TV Tenis. However, the project was short-lived and was discontinued in multiplex 4 in 2018.
Uncertainty surrounding Czech Television
The commercial Prima Group is currently in a favourable position to launch a free-to-air sports channel, which plays into its business plans. This is because the domestic public service media are currently under intense pressure and face a serious threat to their existing independence. The planned financial cuts are weakening the position of traditional institutions, including Czech Television and Czech Radio.
This unstable situation is having a direct impact on the position of the thematic channel ČT sport, whose long-standing dominance in free-to-air terrestrial broadcasting in this category may wane as a result of these pressures. The Czech Television project, which has been operating successfully on the market for twenty years, may lose its solid foundation and current standing as a result of the funding cuts. This opens up an opportunity for Prima to fill the emerging gap and offer viewers a commercial alternative.
You cannot step into the same river twice
Although sport has been virtually unheard of for Prima in recent years – it does not even broadcast a dedicated sports news programme – in the past it carried out an ambitious project involving the UEFA Champions League, which it offered to viewers on its themed channel, Prima Cool. Whilst this move did attract the necessary audience to the screens at the time, it had no long-term prospects.
Presenter Libor Bouček became the main face and presenter of these attractive football broadcasts, hosting both the pre-match and post-match studio segments. His professional yet entertaining approach gave the broadcasts of that time a distinctive character and made this demanding sports format accessible to the general public. These historical experiences show that, whilst Prima certainly has a legacy to build on, the market has changed over the course of more than ten years, and it cannot be assumed that the same approach will work today as it did back then.
Source: mediaguru.cz