Discovery’s decision to buy the Polish DTT channel Metro is in many respects a vote of confidence in the country’s TV industry.
While it is no surprise, with the US company effectively exercising an option to gain full control a year after it had bought a minority stake from Agora, it does send out a positive message to those concerned about possible future changes in media legislation.
As previously reported by Broadband TV News, these could see the permitted level of foreign ownership in TV stations reduced to as little as 15% and have far-reaching consequences for companies such as Scripps Networks Interactive, which wholly owns the national broadcaster TVN and will of course soon be owned by Discovery, following a $14.6 billion deal announced late last month.
Only this week, we have seen criticism of the national transmission company Emitel and the fact that it is wholly owned by another foreign concern, namely the investment group Alinda Capital Partners.
Emitel oversees the running of Mux-8, a recently launched multiplex that carries a total of four new commercial channels – Nowa, Zoom TV, WP and Metro.
Discovery was one of the bidders for a licence on Mux-8 but ultimately lost out to the Polish group Agora, which has operated Metro through its subsidiary Green Content. However, it wasted little time in buying a minority (48.94%) stake in the channel for PLN14 million in late 2016 and has now bought the remaining 51.06% for PLN19 million.
Metro launched offering viewers a mix of movies, serials and lifestyle programmes. While it has hardly set the Polish TV market alight, its audience share of 0.2% in the first half of the year was higher than that of any of the other new channels on Mux-8.
With Discovery’s experience behind it, Metro is now likely to become a more important player in Poland’s TV industry. Discovery, too, will also become an even more significant player.
