Nine moves to digital strategy with major changes to brand, channels, HD and streaming
Nine Entertainment Co has set its sights on improving its digital assets announcing a slew of new services, channels and a programmatic play as well as an overhaul of its corporate brand.
Among the new announcements at Nine’s 2016 upfront event today were: the move to simulcast its main channel in definition; a new lifestyle multichannel NineLife; a live streaming strategy named NineNow; a focus on more Australian content; moves towards a data strategy lading to automated TV buying.
The company is heralding these changes with a new unifying brand identity with chief revenue officer Peter Wiltshire saying: “We are bringing our family together under a common anchor with a heritage with the Nine dots and that means consumers have a better chance to understand when they are consuming content from Nine Entertainment.”
What about nineMSN?
Australia’s largest digital brand is now solely own by Nine Ent – But, Microsoft have long since flown the coop, we have 9NOW…
So, is the msn in ninemsn really staying put??
Still don’t understand why all four channels can’t be broadcast in HD, is it because of a lack of spectrum? one can only hope the live streaming option will be in HD.
Any chance you can upload high Def versions of the NineGo! and NineGEM logos?
Any indication as to whether WIN Television will get the new Lifestyle Channel 9Life or changing their channel numbers Gem & GO!?
David, there’s never been enough spectrum per broadcaster for that. The digital networks have only ever had 23.1Mbps to play with. HD was originally designed for around 20Mbps, and over time in the last 20 years as this has been cut in half with better MPEG-2, the leftover space has been filled with SD simulcasts and multichannels.
They can’t switch to MPEG-4 without losing a lot of viewers.
Leaps and bounds forward for Aussie television! Also great to see Nine leading the charge!
Once 9 loses its MSN data offering, its bye bye. It already lost 30% of its home page traffic after IE changed its homepage to msn.com.au
Branding could still do with some work. Something old mate Eddi tried doing by removing the dots but some bright spark was stuck in the past and had to bring them back.
sounds like they are following sbs with the main ch being broadcast in sd and hd.
ditch those shopping channels and there should be enough bandwidth to go around
or better yet, set an end date for SD stb compatibility
most sd only boxes are getting on to 10 – 15 years old and a hd box can be purchased for under $25
Good on ya channel 9 you are going ahead in leaps and bounds
Hang on isn’t 9HD back to the future for channel 9, because before the days of multichannelling by commercial TV channel 9’s main channel was 9HD & you also had the SD version.. 9HD lasted 18 months from March 17, 2008 to 26th of September, 2010 with breakaway programming from 2nd Ausgust 2009 unnnntil it ceased broadcasting & Gem tookover. http://webarchive.linc.tas.gov.....ki/Nine_HD
Apparently a journo from Mediaweek has confirmed with Nine that NineHD will be using MPEG4.
Good move.
I guess they are still simulcasting in MPEG-2 standard def so that keeps all the viewers with old decoders.
Martin, in fact 9HD existed from 2001, it was just an MPEG-2 simulcast as mandated by law. They were also mandated to show 30 hours per week of native HD programming. NineHD was the first network to show a native HD broadcast in Australia (that wasn’t a test demonstration), with the series “Judging Amy”.
(the mandate kicked off in 2003 but they started native HD in 2002; there was a lot of upscaling, remember)
Perhaps investing in spellcheck? Some blatant errors…
Good to see Channel 9 overhauling their channel. HD + a good streaming channel is needed. 9Jumpin was great to catch up on shows, but dint have proper functionality to be accessed via Apple TV etc. Plus, it didn’t retain ALL episodes – something they should keep in mind
It’s great to see free to air channels overhauling and updating their broadcasting.
Hopefully NineLife will offer high quality programming
I think they need to re-think Go and Gem. What do they offer? What differentiates them? They haven’t been branded properly/ Why not combine it into one channel or even combine it with NineLife. It is a tad confusing having all these different channels with no clear difference between them.
Will the channel changes be carried over to WIN?
New channel 9HD and 9 Life on channel 94 on November 26.
SBS channel 30HD .
SBS channel 33 Food Network Launch Novemnber 17.
Channel 2, 7 and 10 should be broadcast in HD.
We would like to see all channel HD.
Tony, you won’t see *all* channels in HD because there simply isn’t enough spectrum bandwidth to give enough bitrate to all of them. Each network was given enough space to do one channel since 2001, which was designed to be for their main channel. However a combination of Alex Encel, Foxtel and the ABC scared the public into believing HDTVs would cost too much ($20,000 was the quoted figure) so they forced the main channels into transmitting SD even though a simple decoder could covert HD into SD, at a price of $700 in 2001 and built into every TV by 2010.
Encel had a lot of European SDTVs to sell, ABC had an agenda of multichannels, and Foxtel wanted a slice of the bandwidth given to them. In the end they all got what they wanted (Encel has since retired) and for the past 6 years we’ve had the main channels in SD only.
Soooo, how hard will it be to get programs to start and finish as per EPG times? they should be timed to at least a tenth of a second….why drift past nominated finish by 10-15 mins – pain in the tail. esp with ill family members who cannot stay up late and want to record and playback next opportunity when they are able to enjoy fully?
Gem isn’t currently carried by Foxtel so when the NineHD comes in anyone know whether or not foxtel will carry it?
@ Geoff: It’s not impossible; it’s done on purpose you know. The 6pm news can start bang on 6pm or 5:59:50pm every day reliably.
Re: Foxtel: Leasing that satellite bandwidth is expensive, since you need a separate feed for every capital city (inserting custom ads isn’t as efficient as on the internet). The only streams on there right now are lower-bitrate SDTV streams that are also MPEG-2 to allow IQ1 and older boxes to view them.
The good news is that there’s no technical reason stopping the following Foxtel boxes from receiving Nine HD:
– IQ2 with cable not satellite
– MyStar HD
– IQ3 with cable or with satellite
Will we have to do anything (eg re-tune) our TV’s or will the change just take place on Nov 26.
Yvonne: Yes, you will need to rescan your TV to get the new channels.
Seven and SBS have launched new channels recently (Racing.com (C78) and The Food Network (C33 formerly SBS3) respectively so a full rescan seems timely.
Any word from OzTAM on timing for catch up numbers? This seems to have been promised for a long time now.
Will 9HD be brought across to WIN??
Retuned and no HD or new channel. Am I missing something?
Can’t get new channels after rescanning. Is it not available in regional towns I am in Bingara. Where do I find it on Foxtel
I retuned twice, but 9hd (channel 90) appear to be having technical dificulties that no TV picture only sound.
I’ve got the same thing as tony above only getting sound no picture?
Too many ads in catch up – low incremental reach on TV – This isn’t the future 9.
Can’t get Life in Newcastle! but agree with too many ads – eg how much actual program was there for the Block auction last night? seemed to be never ending ads.
Cant get new channel northern nsw how come
What a let down – regional Australia left out again – doesn’t Ch9 own NBN – why the delay? Don’t even need HD – let’s just get the channels?
Many tv’s in particular older models will require a software update before sound and picture on 9 hd will work. Contact your tv manufacturer and ask them for help (manufacturer phone numbers can usually be found on a sticker on the back of your tv.
is channel one HD the same HD for channel 90 after retune? If so channel 9HD shows audio only..
Don’t really care if 9/NBN in SD or HD – cant be too hard to throw the switch to feed LIFE channel – bit different to sport, cooking contests and talent shows.
So many new channels now but the content is poor. Mainly reruns of The Block, Big Bang Theory, and American dime-a-dozen B-lister programs. Nothing listed on the tv guide that would make me watch. Disappointing.
Regional viewers left out again. Already don’t watch nrl because of poor quality. Looks like the crickets out as well.
THIS MAY BE OF INTEREST>>>>>>EXCLUSIVE: A number of viewers have been asking about WIN’s plans for the primary channel to switch to High Definition.
TV Tonight can reveal WIN TV CEO Andrew Lancaster has issued a memo to staff earlier this week:
As you will be aware Nine are planning to air their main channel in HD and to launch a new channel by the end of this week.
Due to the short notice given, WIN Network will not be launching these channels at the same time as Nine.
From a broadcast engineering perspective, WIN is a more complex business with a great deal more markets across a larger geographic area and as such the addition of any new channels will take time and substantial capital investment. We are moving to have the capacity to run new channels across our network with our main channel being aired in High Definition our priority.
As we get closer to a launch date for WIN’s HD channel we will update you
To Andrew Lancaster, How about an approximate date to change win to digital with new channels. 2016, 2020, 2030??