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LBC
Lebanese Forces launch web-based television station
Thu, 2011-07-28 09:21 - By
Digital Media, Media Business, Media, Jeita Country Club, LBC, Lebanese Broadcasting Corporation, Lebanese Forces, LFTV, Pierre Daher, Samir Geagea, TheDailyStar
In efforts to build a free and democratic media, Lebanese Forces launched LFTV, a web-based television. Leader of the Lebanese Forces Samir Geagea, affirmed the party’s commitment to liberalise the media.
“While the Lebanese Forces is building a free media and making it the free and democratic media that meets with the current historical people’s movements, we find some political factions dragging Lebanese media down using it as a mere tool for political propaganda filled with misperceptions, slanders, allegations and personal offences,” Geagea said during his speech at the launching ceremony Tuesday night at Jeita Country Club.
Karim Daoud: Digital content distribution to every connected device brings entertainment, services, information and education
Sat, 2011-04-09 10:17 - By
Interview & Opinion, Media Business, Media, Telecom, All Asia Networks (ASTRO), Booz Allen and Hamilton, INTIGRAL, Karim Daoud, LBC, Rotana, Saudi Research Marketing Group (SRMG), Saudi Telecom (STC), twofour54
mediaME speaks to Karim Daoud, CEO of Intigral, a leading digital content, provider which is a joint venture between Saudi Telecom (STC), Saudi Research Marketing Group (SRMG), and All Asia Networks (ASTRO). Karim tells us about prospects for digital content in the region and the world of entertainment, services, information, and education brought together by Intigral-powered solutions.
Q. Kindly introduce yourself and your company.
Intigral is an integrated digital media service provider born in October 2009 as a joint-venture between Saudi Telecom (STC), Saudi Research Marketing Group (SRMG), and All Asia Networks (ASTRO). Intigral is a one-stop-shop for a comprehensive and converged digital content business. That includes aggregation, acquisition, enhancement, enablement, management, delivery and promotion of digital content across multiple platforms, with an overlay of digital advertising solutions and other monetization models and opportunities. Our direct clients are the regional (MENA) telcos and ISPs, and our solutions are based on a deep understanding of consumers’ media usages and habits.
I joined Intigral in March 2010 with a mandate to build a leading digital media business in the Middle East. I come to Intigral with more than 12 years experience in strategy, management and corporate development in the media and telecom industries in the Middle East. My previous positions were at twofour54 (Strategy and Business Development), LBC-Rotana (M&A, strategy, business development), and Booz Allen and Hamilton (with a focus on telecom and technology). I hold an MBA from INSEAD, and a Master’s of Science from the Ecole Polytechnique in France.
Q. Intigral is a service provider for management consulting digital media content. What brought about the establishment of Intigral? What was the market gap you were seeking to fill considering already existing telecom content providers? How will Intigral outperform currently existing services?
We are single-mindedly focused on digital content in all its forms (audio, video, text), and view technology as the crucial enabler of our business. Back in 2009, our shareholders saw an opportunity to create an independent service provider that would serve all telecom operators and ISPs in the Middle East by providing them with turn-key, white label digital media solutions. Looking at the competitive landscape, you will find many regional or international players providing mobile value added services, video content solutions, or managed web services. The value proposition of Intigral is the ability to provide all three services from our converged technology platforms, thereby enabling a truly converged digital content consumption on three screens (IPTV, Web and mobile).
Q. Tell us about your main content partners and the nature of the future partnerships you expect to build.
We view ourselves as a distribution and marketing partner to content owners, allowing their content to be consumed on all devices including mobile, PCs, tablets and TV screens. Monetization models today are mainly subscription and transaction-based, but new advertising based models are slowly emerging.
Today, we have signed up all major regional and international rights owners for channels and video content, and are expecting to add more partners as we expand our channel offering from 50 to 150 over the next few months. From a mobile standpoint, we have agreements with more than 200 local content providers in Saudi Arabia across all categories such as health, religion, poetry, sports, news and finance, utilities and others. And finally, we are reaching out to all regional content developers/producers in the new categories such as gaming, social networks, music, etc… The business model with rights owners is mainly based on revenue share, but there could be some cases where we consider upfront license fees.
Q. Kindly explain your mobile TV strategy which is set to offer over a 100 channels. How does it work and what’s the benefit to the TV stations in terms of revenue.
Our TV strategy is to offer a mix of linear channels (free-to-air and pay-TV) and video on demand libraries to our broadband IPTV subscribers. For Pay-TV players such as Al Jazeera Sports, Abu Dhabi Media Company, and Orbit Showtime, we pretty much act as a distributor of their premium content (without their specific set-top-boxes), so we help them increase their reach into MENA’s broadband households and generate additional subscription revenues. For advertising-funded networks, we sign carriage deals with no monetary impact, but they benefit in terms of brand association and communication exposure.
Our TV offering is mainly geared towards operators’ broadband set-top box connected households with more than 6MB/s of bandwidth, but we can also develop customized mobile TV bouquets with a sub-set of our available channels.
Q. Tell us about the feedback from mobile users in Saudi Arabia and the GCC regarding responses to these services. Who are your target customer segments for your different service offerings?
In terms of mobile content services, we build on a very solid subscriber base in Saudi Arabia already consuming our content via SMS/MMS services. Our strategy over the last nine months has been to gradually introduce portals and applications, allowing them to access this premium content through user-friendly interfaces, surfing on the increasing penetration of smartphones in the Kingdom. An example of this is STC’s Sports portal “Nadeek” which has already attracted a large number of subscribers and provided them with a unique navigation experience into their favorite sports content, in addition to providing chatting and social networking capabilities.
We are also focusing on new categories such as games, social networks, and utilities (location-based services) that will be launched to the market by Q3 of 2012. The model we are advocating is a “freemium” model with a first layer of information provided for-free through the applications, and the more premium content accessible though weekly or monthly subscriptions.
In terms of IPTV, after six months of soft launch aimed at testing the service, STC has commercially launched Invision, its interactive TV service, in January 2011. The uptake among the qualifying subscriber-base has been very encouraging in the first two months of the campaign, with many households being drawn to the unique selling proposition offering all premium sports content into One Box.
Q. What are the next markets you will be entering following Saudi Arabia, would you like to discuss your regional strategy and services?
Our mandate is regional. We will target the GCC and other Middle Eastern telecom operators and ISPs. Having secured content rights for the leading market in the region, it is easy for us to extend those rights to smaller territories and approach other telcos with our offering, be it for IPTV, managed web services, or mobile digital content and applications. Again, our objective is to become the partner of choice of telecom operators for all their digital content needs, and contribute to their customer retention and churn reduction efforts by providing them with the most attractive content offering for their subscriber base.
Q. Please explain the nature of the advertising opportunities you offer clients and advertising agencies? Do you also offer database marketing opportunities?
Our current distribution model is mainly based on subscription fees for premium content. We recognize however the need to have ad-funded content delivery for some categories of content. We already have online advertising opportunities on our web assets, and are in the final stages of building ad serving capabilities for our mobile content offering. Naturally, the category everybody expects to pick up in the region is mobile advertising on telecom services such as messaging and notifications. We put our data mining and database marketing capabilities at the service of our regional telco partners to maximize ad sales on their inventory.
Q. Anything else you would like to add?
After one year of building up capabilities and launching services with our key client in Saudi Arabia, we are ready for business in the region. We are very bullish about the prospects for digital content in the region and view in every new connected device a potential customer of what we believe will be an amazing world of entertainment, services, information, and education brought together by Intigral-powered solutions. Naturally, being the link in the middle of the value chain, our long-term success will largely depend on the content partners, large or small, that we manage to bring on board. We watch with constant amazement the burgeoning of the content and applications industry across the Arab world, and will reach out to all digital entrepreneurs to offer them access to the most promising markets in the region.
Exciting times!
The 'political problem' at LBC
Wed, 2008-11-19 07:27 - By
RapidTVNews reports that a 'political' problem is brewing at LBC. Earlier this year, Samir Geagea, leader of the Lebanese Forces, demanded that Pierre Daher, CEO and founder, surrender ownership of the TV station back to the Lebanese Forces political party. Later in the year Prince Al Waleed Bin Talal, increased his shareholding in the station and now owns 60% of LBC.
Here's the historic background of this story. Some 10 years into the Lebanese civil war (1975-1990) a TV station was formed by Bashir Gemayel, then leader of the Lebanese Forces, and reflecting the mostly Maronite Christian position during the fierce sectarian battles then taking place in the country. Now, LBC has battles of its own. Gemayel was later assassinated. Gemayel’s co-founder was Pierre Daher. LBC has since grown to be a very major player on the pan-Arab TV scene with Daher supervising expansion onto satellite (1997), and overseas into the US, Australia and Asia. Now the channel is enveloped in another bitter battle, with the station accused of having abandoned its heritage.
Complicating the issue is the fact that the satellite channel was initially backed (49%) by Sheikh Salah Kamel (best known for his ownership of Arab Radio & Television, ART). In December 2003 that portion was acquired by Saudi billionaire Prince Alwaleed bin Talal who has since further consolidated his investment into the business.
The Lebanese Forces (LF) has now issued a fresh statement clearly attacking Pierre Daher. "The news of the LF is subject to scandalous neglect from the LBC," the LF media statement said, noting that the LBC "has not allowed LF figures to take part in political news shows for a long time." The claim continued: “And here a question is raised. Why is LBC ignoring the news and opinions of the LF?"
The statement also criticized Daher directly, saying his "attitude is that of a militia because he sold most of LBC's shares without consulting anyone, earning him a lot of money." Daher had earlier said that LBC would under no circumstances serve a single party's purposes. The news station "refuses to be a mouthpiece of any political party," he said.
Nevertheless, there’s still a lawsuit rumbling through the Lebanese courts claiming ownership by the Lebanese Forces. LBC has also changed its shareholder structure, and in recent years, Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, through his media company Rotana, has acquired a great number of the network’s corporate shares which if nothing else complicates matters hugely.
Hawyia launches Leading Business Centres' identity
Sun, 2008-11-09 20:38 - By
Product Launch, Advertising, Hawyia, Haytham Al Haj Ali, LBC, Leading Business Centres, Yousuf Lootah
Hawyia has boost up its corporate partnership with business centers operating in Dubai following its successful launching of Leading Business Centre's (LBC) identity.
Prince Al Waleed Bin Talal acquires 85% of LBC
Mon, 2008-07-07 07:22 - By
Rapid TV News reports that Saudi billionaire Prince Al Waleed bin Talal has increased his ownership stake in pan-Arab satellite channel LBC. Local reports say Prince Al Waleed now controls 85% of the operation and its partner PAC.
LBC Group’s capital now stands at $123m. LBC is run by its chairman and DG Pierre Daher, who in a statement said the capital increase would strengthen the financial capacity, competitiveness and productivity of the channel. "This step comes within a comprehensive plan of 5 years, and includes all television channels affiliated to Rotana," which is said to currently be the biggest producer and distributor of Arab music and increasingly movies.
Daher emphasized that there was no risk that PAC or LBCSAT would lose their Lebanese identity. The acquisition would also benefit the local LBC channel, he added, as all programmes produced are distributed to the local and international stations.
Study shows Lebanese prefer to watch news, favour LBC and Future
Sat, 2008-02-09 23:34 - By
AMEInfo reports that a Arab Advisors Group conducted a survey showing that 37.6% and 37.1% of respondents named LBC and Future TV, respectively, as one of five stations Lebanese watched most. As you would expect, news was found to be the most popular program type among all age groups.
The survey also revealed terrestrial TV remains top in Lebanon while satellite TV gains some following.
LBC’s Perfect Brides dazzle in diamonds
Thu, 2007-07-05 11:14 - By
The Perfect Brides from LBC’s new reality TV program this week experienced the pride of wearing spectacular diamond wedding sets from DTC’s new Bridal program.
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