eMedia Investments will launch its new free-to-air TV news channel OpenNews on 1 November on its Openview satellite service, with the social media infused news channel that will chase news that's trending and going viral.
OpenNews will be done from a new interactive studio in Cape Town just like when e.tv first launched its eNews TV news bulletins in 1999 from its former Longkloof Studios to bring South African viewers an alternative to the television news from the South African public broadcaster.
OpenNews that will go live at 17:00 on Thursday 1 November on Openview channel 120, will broadcast until 23:00 at night and initially for just 6 hours per day.
The rest of the 18 hours will be packaged international news acquired from global broadcasters.
With OpenNews, eMedia Investments is broadening the TV news offering available on Openview with the platform that added the BBC World News channel in 2017 and moved it to channel 121 since 20 August to be on an adjacent channel number of the soon-to-launch OpenNews.
To differentiate from the heavy Johannesburg news bubble of other TV news channels like eNCA (DStv 403), SABC News (DStv 404) and the country's major daily TV news bulletins all done from Johannesburg studios in Hyde Park and Auckland Park, OpenNews will utilise a new Cape Town studio and do the news from the Mother City just like when e.tv launched its eNews brand 19 years ago.
The new interactive studio in Cape Town will see OpenNews anchors draw on content from multiple platforms, and besides coverage of politics, crime and courts, OpenNews will take a keen interest in celebrity and showbiz news.
Although not direct competition since the target audience is different, OpenNews will be a rival for eMedia Investments' own 10-year old eNCA that is produced specifically for MultiChoice's DStv satellite pay-TV platform as part of an existing channel carriage agreement.
OpenNews will also be competition for SABC News as well as Newzroom Afrika, the new TV news channel that is set to replace Mzwanele Manyi's axed Afro Worldview on DStv in early 2019.
eMedia's plan is to bolster the loss-making Openview's existing content proposition and TV channel offering to attract bigger uptake of this free-to-air satellite TV service under consumers.
Openview grows at roughly 35 000 new set-top box (STB) activations per month, but the number of 1.15 million activated STB at the end of March 2018 but Openview still has to almost double its viewership ratings before it can become profitable.
The existence of OpenNews will also create a news channel and news content fall-back fail-safe option for eMedia in the eventuality that the MultiChoice and M-Net contracts for eNCA, and eNuus supplied to kykNET (DStv 144) are not renewed should future channel carriage renegotiations fail and eNCA get dropped and that would otherwise leave eMedia without any news channel.
e.tv earlier this month also added a new hour of Afrikaans TV news and current affairs programming on its eExtra (Openview 105 / DStv 195 / StarSat 489) channel, comprising of the half hour TV news bulletin, Nuusdag, and the half hour studio desk interview show, Nuusdag Perspektief, that also form part of its broader TV news content expansion plans.
eMedia Investments says OpenNews will keep viewers informed and entertained with "a fast-paced overview of the top local and international news stories" in an on-air style in which anchors will "weigh in on the top stories, share their opinions and engage with viewers in real time."
"OpenNews will offer viewers an entirely new way of experiencing the news," says Nisa Allie, OpenNews managing director, who has been an eNCA assignment editor and news editor in Cape Town.
"Sharing the screen with our anchors is a team of savvy video journalists, who will approach news in a fresh, punchy, fluid and engaging way. Using the latest technology, we are moving away from the traditional format and merging television news with social media."
Marlon Davids, managing director of e.tv channels, says "As the first local TV news channel on the Openview platform, OpenNews is an exciting addition to our offering".
"It's not just a first for Openview, but also a first for the country. For the first time, free-to-air viewers will truly be able to experience the news in a lively, interactive and unrestrained way."
