HONG KONG -- Rupert Murdoch-backed channels have won approval for a big expansion in China, bringing the media tycoon a step closer to achieving his ambition of broadcasting Chinese-lingo programs across the country.
News Corp.-owned Star is due to announce in the next few days that it has permission to beam Mandarin-lingo entertainment channel Xingkong Weishi (Starry Sky) to hotels above three stars and into residential compounds where foreigners and overseas Chinese live, the Financial Times of London reported on Tuesday.
News Corp. has said it plans to invest well over $100 million in the channel during the next three to four years.
The news comes a day after Phoenix Satellite, 38% owned by Star, won similar landing rights for its InfoNews Channel in China, making it the first foreign-owned Chinese-language 24-hour news service to be allowed to broadcast there.
This raises hopes that Phoenix will finally be able to make the money-bleeding operation profitable.
Until now, the 2-year-old Mandarin-lingo channel has had a limited audience in Hong Kong's largely Cantonese-speaking cable households and satellite dish owners throughout Asia. Revenues have been scant.
"Currently it mostly carries advertising for other News Corp. channels," said Robert Uren, Phoenix's VP of international affairs.
With Chinese domestic travel on the increase, he foresees a potentially substantial viewership for InfoNews. "It means that we can develop an audience that will justify advertising on it," Uren said.
Xingkong Weishi is restricted to a tiny area in the southern province of Guangdong, where its satellite signals are piped by a local cable TV company to about 1 million viewers. It will now be able to reach about 500,000 hotel rooms as well as foreign communities, including 250,000 Taiwanese living in and around Shanghai, China's biggest city.
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