Leading Italian commercial broadcaster Mediaset has teamed up with Tunisian-born businessman Tarak Ben Ammar (through Quinta Communication) to launch a new commercial TV channel for North Africa.
Announcing the initiative in Cannes, the two partners said they would initially invest €25 million to relaunch Nessma TV, a Tunisia-based satellite TV channel launched in the spring of 2007 by the Karoui&Karoui World group. Nessma TV is currently received by over 7.5 million households in Algeria, Libya, Morocco and Tunisia, via the Badr 3/4 and Nilesat 101/102 satellites. Its programme schedule is made up of imported movies, TV series, musical video clips and formats such as Star Academy.
The channel’s potential audience base is 90 million in North Africa plus the 10 million large North African community in Europe (mainly in France and Italy). Nessma TV will be distributed terrestrially in North African countries and via satellite in Europe. The new shareholding structure of Nessma TV will now be as follows: 50% Karoui&Karoui World, 25% Mediaset Group and 25% Quinta Communication.
French groups Lagardère and Bouygues and numerous Arab funds were also reported to have been interested in the Tunisian channel.
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