Broadcasters turn to local sports for rise in ratings
SOME TELEVISION broadcasters are turning their attention to local sporting events to boost their ratings amid fierce competition.
Surin Krittayaphongphun, executive vice president of Bangkok Entertainment Company, said that although his company’s flagship Channel 3 was experiencing business difficulties at present, the 3SD and 3 Family digital channels run by BEC’s sister company BEC-Multimedia were enjoying positive feedback from audiences.
“We are making 3SD into a sport-entertainment centre. Furthermore, we are investing heavily in live broadcasting of sports events in which the company takes part as the official broadcaster,” he said.
The live-broadcast team would feed telecasts of sports events mainly for 3SD.
Recently, the company was appointed as host broadcaster for the 22nd Suzuki-ITTF Asian Table Tennis Championships in Pattaya, which ran from September 26 to October 3. Channel 3 has also secured broadcast rights to Uefa Euro 2016 soccer qualifying and MotoGP motorcycle racing.
Thairath TV is also very active in live broadcasting of sport tournaments, particularly those of the Thai national soccer team, because such events gain strong interest from the local audience. According to Nielsen (Thailand), Thairath TV’s rating surged to 7.5, or 4,939,460 viewers per minute, during the live match between Thailand and Iraq in the 2018 Fifa World Cup Russia Qualifiers on September 8.
An analyst at the National Broadcasting and Telecommunica-tions Commission said Thairath TV’s rating at that period outpaced market leader Channel 7’s 6.51.
Apart from free TV broadcasters, TrueVisions, a leading pay-TV operator, recently announced a Bt4.2-billion investment for broadcasting rights to live matches of four key soccer leagues in the country for four consecutive years, from next year to 2020, from the Football Association of Thailand. They are 306 live matches of the Thai Premier League, 306 of Yamaha League 1 (Thai Division 1 League), 114 of the Toyota League Cup and 85 of the Chang AF Club.
MCOT president Sivaporn Chomsuwan told The Nation he was also interested in live broadcasts of local soccer in order to boost Channel 9’s ratings.
“Through our long-term partnership with TrueVisions, we would like to continue our live telecasts of the Thai Premier League and extend that to a possible opportunity of bringing other key local football matches to our viewers,” he said.
