Ten reveals new digital channel Eleven as future home of The Simpsons and Neighbours
Just a week after Seven announced it was to launch a new male-focused digital channel 7mate, Ten has announced its next ‘distinctly youthful’ digital channel – Eleven, which will see a joint venture with CBS Studios to provide the content.
As part of the move, cartoon series The Simpsons, a longtime stalwart of Ten programming and Neighbours, will both move across to Eleven.
Announcing the deal with CBS Studios International, Ten said: “Eleven will also become the exclusive free-to-air home of the iconic The Simpsons.”
While CBS Studios will not be a co-owner of the channel itself, which would probably not be permissible under the current free TV regulations, Ten and CBS have created a content JV – ElevenCo Pty Ltd. This offering will be owned two-thirds by Ten and one-third by CBS Studios.The two companies have also extended their existing output deal which already sees CBS output such as NCIS, NCIS: Los Angeles, Rules of Engagement, Medium, The Good Wife and Hawaii Five-0 appearing on Ten.
Ten programming boss David Mott discussed his strategies for the channel with Mumbrella earlier this month:
Eleven’s content will include new episodes of Futurama, The Cleveland Show, Supernatural, Stargate, Dexter, Smallville, The Office, Nurse Jackie and 90210.
CBS archive content that Eleven will draw on will include Everybody Loves Raymond, Sex and the City, JAG, Frasier, Judging Amy, Happy Days and MacGyver.
The move appears to be a defensive one to shore up Ten’s valuable younger demographic, rather than a more aggressive move to drive the network into wider demographics thanks to the success of Masterchef.
One thing missing from the announcment was any reference to Big Brother. There has been continuing speculation within the TV production community that it would form a part of Ten’s plans for its new channel.
With the move of Neighbours from Ten, the network will introduce a national news show at 6pm, followed by local news at 6.30pm.
Mott said: “Neighbours is an important and cherished member of the Network Ten family. “We believe Neighbours is perfectly suited to Eleven’s audience strategy and will find a successful and enduring home on Eleven. We will round out the first 25 years with a bang, and give Australia’s most successful drama a new home to keep it vibrant in the schedule for the next 25.”
Unlike 7mate which launches next month, Eleven will not be on air until early next year. Unlike 7mate it will be in standard definition rather than high definition. Ten’s digital sports channel One is already in HD.
Network Ten CEO Grant Blackley said:
“CBS Studios is a leading producer of quality programming for the global marketplace. In addition to its successful pipeline of content to the CBS network, which has been the lead network in the US for the last 8 out of 10 years, CBS produces content for the youth-targeted network, the CW. Our established output deal with CBS has been long and fruitful, delivering hits such as NCIS, NCIS: Los Angeles, Rules of Engagement, Medium, The Good Wife and the much-anticipated Hawaii Five-0 to Australian audiences.”
He added: “Eleven will deliver a distinct destination for Australian consumers and advertisers. The channel’s ‘distinctly youthful’ focus will be well suited to fostering a strong level of online community and social media engagement, and the format will provide opportunities for a high level of sponsor integration – such as segment and program hostings.”
CBS Studios International President Armando Nuñez said: “This new venture is an extension of our international strategy to match CBS’s globally popular content with best-in-class partners – for both establishing new ventures, as well as licensing our shows.”
Tim Burrowes founded Mumbrella in 2008. He worked on Mumbrella until 2021. At various points he was editor, content director and editor-at-large.
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is this PR Web?
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That’s going to rip some holes in Foxtel. The baby sitting channel…
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What’s up with the shitty 70/80s logos for these +1 channels. First “7mate”‘s, now this?
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well done!
more choice for consumers (and media buyers).
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It will also rip holes in GO! They will have nothing to run if this deal go ahead…
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wonder if this means aussie content will appear on CBS in america? wonder if ROVE is involved….. hopefully we can export them something….
gotta say pretty let down that all the content is from OS and nothing about locally produced. ho hum
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Zero points for originality. Logo is a complete rip off of E4 in the UK.
http://www.e4.com/
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If Neighbours moves, I assume that means Ten doesn’t get local content points for it.
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Will Southern Cross show it ???? Like next year or 2013
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Good point, Angus – I wonder if we’ll see repeats on Ten to help hit the quota…
Cheers,
Tim – Mumbrella
i cant wait for the New channel11 as i a big fan of NCIS and what would they do with the old TEN if every show will be going to the new channel 11. TEN is makeing more money then anyone so what will happen now. i don’r think it would work at all it mite work we will just wait and see what will happen.
from wayde sorensen xx
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Is just me, or does the 11 logo look vaguely phallic?
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they need a new logo
from wayde sorensen xx
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I can’t see it “ripping holes in Foxtel”. 90% of the audience will come from FTA-only homes, as is the case with the other DFTAs…
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the logo looks similar to “adobe photoshop express” app for iphone / ipad
both remind me of sheets of toilet paper hanging from a roll….
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“While CBS Studios will not be a co-owner of the channel itself, which would probably not be permissible under the current free TV regulations”
‘Probably not’? Wow, this really comes across as ‘I couldn’t be bothered looking it up’.
If you’d looked it up, you’d probably find that restrictions on foreign ownership were lifted in 2006, that eleven won’t be delivered under a separate licence anyway, so the issue would be foreign ownership in Ten.
Oh hang on, isn’t already part-owned by Canadians?
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Hi John,
I actually meant from the point of view that the digital channels were gifted to the existing free to air players. I suspect that they will not be able to simply sell them on whetehr in part or in full. If you can answer that point in more detail, I’d be interested to know the answer.
Cheers,
Tim – Mumbrella
THE LOGO IS CRAP BUT THE CHANNEL SOUNDS GOOD!
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I don’t know for sure but I’d take a guess and say that any Aussie content on the new channel will count towards their quota – if it doesn’t then all they need to do is take Conroy (assuming he still is communications minister after all the election dust has settled) skiing for the weekend and it will be fine.
This makes Channel 10 the only commercial broadcaster producing local content (excluding Go!’s 30 second “news” updates) for their second SD channel – good on them.
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I would like to see at least one of these chanels have more movies , even old ones like from the 80’s and the 90’s, there’s plenty out there for good old favourites.
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Wasnt there a press release today that Chl 10 are looking to take their news to an hour from 6pm? So they would have to move Neighbours to accommodate. Or rather this is about accommodating that move?
So I cant remember where I read that today, but I know i saw it.
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Gifted? I guess those hundreds of millions of dollars of licence fees are just a donation to treasury then.
Anyway, maybe they could structure it as a separate business unit, but the multichannels are provided under the same licence as ten’s main channel. The foreign ownership restrictions used to apply to the licences, not the channels themselves. These days it isn’t so relevant.
Also, content on the multiple channels definitely can not count towards aus content quotas. So ten mustn’t need neighbours any more.
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Great to see that there is going to be another digital channel. However I don’t agree with the fact that the new channel “11” won’t have much Aussie content on it. Sorry but our TV is dominated by to much US shows.
We need to have an all Aussie tv channel, dedicated to Aussie shows/movies. We are losing our identity,
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Who’d bother gettng foxtel with so many new digital channels on free to air. Don’t know why they are keeping neighbours. The show has half the rating of Home and Away with viewers falling.
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No John, CanWest (the Canadians) sold their share of Network Ten a while ago.
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Yes will Southern Cross Ten be getting ths new channel 11 when it does start next year i hope so for Neighbours fans or will we just have to wait untill 2013
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I can’t believe it occured to anyone to mention the logo. They won’t be airing shows about the logo.
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I dont really see this channel being good they are basically showing shows they already have airing on channel ten, whats the point why doesnt ten do something special and put a full channel of new shows much like channel go did, they have cbs which has awsome content in the usa yet ten doesnt use it. all i here is simpsons futurama and neighbours its going to be a lame channel 7mate and Gem will own this
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WOw this fails Eleven’s content will include new episodes of Futurama, The Cleveland Show, Supernatural, Stargate, Dexter, Smallville, The Office, Nurse Jackie and 90210.
CBS archive content that Eleven will draw on will include Everybody Loves Raymond, Sex and the City, JAG, Frasier, Judging Amy, Happy Days and MacGyver. new episodes why not PUT NEW SHOWS, im seeing more of the same crap on free 2 air and nothing new ive been watching everybody likes Raymond for 10 yrs IM SICK OF IT i hate fraiser they are drainging these shows why dont they put new content MAn
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I for one am excited to finally have more choice without having to pay for cable. More movies would be good and none of those crappy old westerns or war movies from the 1950s either, plenty of good ones from the last 20 years they could air. Bring it on… nothing worse than multiple channels and still nothing decent to watch. I want good interesting variety! Some shows are cool for re-runs, but a nice mix is what we all want to balance it out. Yay for technology!
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