The changes we are seeing in Russia’s TV industry go beyond the upcoming new limits on foreign ownership and ban on non-terrestrial TV channel advertising.
The former, which come into effect in 2016, will affect the entire media market and hit the print sector hardest. However, they are already proving a major challenge for Modern Times Group (MTG), which closed its DTH platform Raduga TV, jointly owned with local partners, earlier this month and is currently looking for ways, staying completely within the law, of maintaining its involvement in the national commercial broadcaster CTC Media.
Although MTG plans to place greater emphasis on its channel business in Russia with the launch of five more services in 2015, this, in turn, will be hit by the advertising ban on non-terrestrial TV that comes into effect next month. It will almost certainly result in the company, along with other content providers, raising their distribution fees in order to make up for any lost income.
Aside from MTG, Disney also faces a major challenge in Russia. It paid $300 million in 2011 for a 49% stake in what is now a local version of the Disney Channel and has to decide whether to stay in the country or cut its losses.
What is missing from this discussion, which most readers view from an outsiders’ perspective, is that the changes currently taking place in the Russian TV industry are having a major impact on local players themselves.
We see this, for instance, in the cable sector, where new rules under which operators do business are currently being formulated.
As a result, it looks likely that they will soon be prohibited from charging viewers for FTA (terrestrial) channels. This will guarantee such channels, which have must-carry status and are seen as “socially significant”, reach the greatest number of viewers.
Meanwhile, in the DTH sector, talks have just taken place between the RSCC and its Chinese counterpart about future cooperation in the development of communications satellites. While links between Russia and Western satellite companies remain strong, this could mark the first step of a re-orientation of sorts.
Although these are undoubtedly challenging times, Russia’s TV industry is still one of the most dynamic – and indeed interesting – in both CEE and Europe as a whole and will undoubtedly remain so for the foreseeable future.
