MTV Networks, which is owned by the third-largest US media company, will probably have a 20 percent increase in Asian advertising sales this year, MTV Networks Chief Executive Officer Tom Freston said.
"We're looking at several years in a row of good healthy growth," Freston said in an interview in Singapore. "We're looking at healthy growth in India, in China, in Korea." MTV advertising sales in Asia last year rose 24 percent, twice the pace of the rest of the world for the company, which is owned by the cable-network unit of New York-based Viacom Inc.
About 150 million homes in Asia have MTV channels, which include Nickelodeon, Freston said.
Rebounding economies across Asia are allowing companies such as Sydney-based News Corp. and Zee Telefilms Ltd., India's biggest publicly traded broadcaster, to sell more advertising.
Advertising expenditure will rise 5.1 percent in the Asia-Pacific region this year to US$68.41 billion, the fastest growth of the world's regions, according to ZenithOptimedia, a U.S.-based media services company.
India's economy may grow at its fastest pace in 15 years, with Asia's third-biggest economy expected to accelerate at an 8.1 percent pace in the year to March 31, according to government estimates.
"India's one of the most interesting markets out there, where you've got this exploding middle class," Freston said. MTV plans to dub about half of Nickelodeon's programming into Hindi this year and may set up a south Indian music channel, he said.
Mumbai-based Zee Telefilms said last month its third-quarter profit rose 27 percent on higher subscription and advertising revenue. Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. last week said it had a 51 percent rise in earnings in the last three months of 2003 as an improved ad market helped boost profit at its cable channels and newspapers.
"It's going to be a pretty good year for the region as a whole" with nations such as China and Indonesia likely to record between 15 percent and 20 percent growth in advertising, said Stephen McKeever, Hong Kong-based head of media and consumer research at Lehman Brothers Asia Ltd.
"The fastest growing area will probably be the cable networks," he said.
MTV has lost no advertisers or revenue as a result of singer Justin Timberlake exposing Janet Jackson's right breast two weeks ago on the National Football League's Super Bowl halftime show, Freston said. MTV produced the program, which was aired on Viacom's CBS network.
In the aftermath of the incident, a US House panel last week passed a bill increasing 10-fold the Federal Communications Commission fines against broadcasters that air indecency on television and radio.
"I'm sure we won't do another show for the NFL," Freston said separately, in a televised interview.
"There's absolutely no economic benefit for us producing part-time shows or other shows like this. We haven't seen any cancellation of advertising," he said.
AIR SUPPORT: The Ministry of National Defense thanked the US for the delivery, adding that it was an indicator of the White House’s commitment to the Taiwan Relations Act Deputy Minister of National Defense Po Horng-huei (柏鴻輝) and Representative to the US Alexander Yui on Friday attended a delivery ceremony for the first of Taiwan’s long-awaited 66 F-16C/D Block 70 jets at a Lockheed Martin Corp factory in Greenville, South Carolina. “We are so proud to be the global home of the F-16 and to support Taiwan’s air defense capabilities,” US Representative William Timmons wrote on X, alongside a photograph of Taiwanese and US officials at the event. The F-16C/D Block 70 jets Taiwan ordered have the same capabilities as aircraft that had been upgraded to F-16Vs. The batch of Lockheed Martin
GRIDLOCK: The National Fire Agency’s Special Search and Rescue team is on standby to travel to the countries to help out with the rescue effort A powerful earthquake rocked Myanmar and neighboring Thailand yesterday, killing at least three people in Bangkok and burying dozens when a high-rise building under construction collapsed. Footage shared on social media from Myanmar’s second-largest city showed widespread destruction, raising fears that many were trapped under the rubble or killed. The magnitude 7.7 earthquake, with an epicenter near Mandalay in Myanmar, struck at midday and was followed by a strong magnitude 6.4 aftershock. The extent of death, injury and destruction — especially in Myanmar, which is embroiled in a civil war and where information is tightly controlled at the best of times —
China's military today said it began joint army, navy and rocket force exercises around Taiwan to "serve as a stern warning and powerful deterrent against Taiwanese independence," calling President William Lai (賴清德) a "parasite." The exercises come after Lai called Beijing a "foreign hostile force" last month. More than 10 Chinese military ships approached close to Taiwan's 24 nautical mile (44.4km) contiguous zone this morning and Taiwan sent its own warships to respond, two senior Taiwanese officials said. Taiwan has not yet detected any live fire by the Chinese military so far, one of the officials said. The drills took place after US Secretary
THUGGISH BEHAVIOR: Encouraging people to report independence supporters is another intimidation tactic that threatens cross-strait peace, the state department said China setting up an online system for reporting “Taiwanese independence” advocates is an “irresponsible and reprehensible” act, a US government spokesperson said on Friday. “China’s call for private individuals to report on alleged ‘persecution or suppression’ by supposed ‘Taiwan independence henchmen and accomplices’ is irresponsible and reprehensible,” an unnamed US Department of State spokesperson told the Central News Agency in an e-mail. The move is part of Beijing’s “intimidation campaign” against Taiwan and its supporters, and is “threatening free speech around the world, destabilizing the Indo-Pacific region, and deliberately eroding the cross-strait status quo,” the spokesperson said. The Chinese Communist Party’s “threats
RSS