Television group Prima wants to make more financial profit from its programmes broadcast in Slovakia. It plans to launch several of its thematic stations there.
The Prima TV group's intention to expand the number of its stations localised for the Slovak audience in Slovakia will include more than two thematic stations, Prima Cool and Prima Love. According to information available to MediaGuru.cz, the plan is to localise up to four thematic stations for Slovakia this year and next year.
Prima Cool SK and Prima Love SK will be the first stations to launch in Slovakia later this year. The former will probably be launched in the first half of the year, the latter in the last quarter of this year.
Prima has not yet provided further information on its plans in Slovakia. It has only confirmed that it has applied to the domestic Radio and Television Broadcasting Council (RRTV) for licences for the Slovak versions of Prima Cool and Prima Love.
However, according to our information, the Slovak version is also to be given to the "detective" channel Prima Krimi and the film Prima Max channel is also being considered. In these cases, their launch in Slovakia would probably fall until 2025. The thematic channels would be distributed in Slovakia via satellite, i.e. in pay-per-view.
The activities on the Slovak market should include the renaming of the existing Prima Plus channel to Prima SK. The Prima Plus channel was launched by Prima in Slovakia in January 2017. Its programming consists of programmes broadcast on the main Prima channel, but it has secured the rights to broadcast in Slovakia. It is available on a pay-per-view basis, thus protecting Prima's revenue that it would lose due to illegal distribution of its stations across borders. Similar reasons seem to be behind the introduction of Slovak versions of thematic stations. It can thus be expected that the Slovak versions will be substantially based on the Czech originals, but may differ in the case of programmes for which the operator will not have secured broadcasting rights.
The Prima Krimi, Prima Max, Prima Love and Prima Cool channels are among the group's strongest thematic stations on the domestic market. Prima Krimi in particular is on the rise, having been last year's top performer, and is currently Prima's biggest ever thematic channel with a share exceeding 4% this January (15+, source: ATO-Nielsen).
Source: mediaguru.cz
