ANN7: Africa News Network 7's channel bumper looks like something dug up out of the Al Jazeera archives and slightly modified.

It swirls, it twirls, it ends with ANN7 - and reminds me of something dug up out of the Al Jazeera archives and slightly modified for the channel's main bumper.

Is the new on-screen main bumper of ANN7 (DStv 405), South Africa's third 24-hour TV news channel, complete with concave blades oscillating around a red micro globe (or is it a Pokemon egg?) really the best Infinity Media could come up with after months of planning and preparing?

Really?

If ANN7's primary colours seen in the studio are red, blue and white, why is the bumper a mad melange of not those colours if the news studio is the thing viewers will see directly after they see this 3D effort with an odd Middle Eastern or oriental influence?

The oddness of the ANN7 opener gives a kind of environmental or nature documentary feel to ANN7 ... which the channel is not. It's purports to be a new news channel.

Visually the bumper lifts out the Asian continent - especially with pronounced emphasis on China and India - with the same emphasis not given to other land masses as prominently.

Keep in mind that the politically connected Guptas and Indian investors are behind this TV news channel from Infinity Media.

FIRST LOOK. ANN7 news studio finally revealed on-air as Infinity Media launches South Africa's third 24-hour TV news channel on DStv.

ANN7 (DStv 405) finally revealed the South African 24-hour TV news channel's news studio in Midrand on-air when the channel went live at 18:00 on MultiChoice's DStv platform on Wednesday evening.

ANN7, run by Infinity Media, did no walk-through premises tour with TV critics or press prior to launch.

ANN7 didn't respond to multiple media enquiries made prior to launch of the news channel regarding the progression of its Midrand studios, the technology which Infinity Media called "state-of-the-art", or any questions regarding the news complex or systems used.

ANN had a launch function on Wednesday evening in the Sandton Convention Centre for the news channel but failed to invite several of the country's longtime TV critics, editors and writers covering television or even tell them about it.

In keeping with the theme of publicity and bad PR from ANN7 the sign outside the Sandton Convention Centre ballroom for the launch function of the new DStv channel didn't even make mention of ANN7 - it proudly only proclaimed "Infinity Media dinner".

ANN7, nicknamed "Gupta news" and "Gupta TV" due to the politically connected Gupta family being shareholders in the news channel venture through Infinity Media, showed time-lapse video photography during its launch broadcast of the construction of the news studio and news hub which took place earlier this year.

The ANN7 news studio is decked out in the colours of red, blue and white, with an angular black anchor desk in front of a video wall.

The swirly ANN7 video graphic logo somehow gives an impression that it was ripped from the Al Jazeera archives.

One South African editor who watched the news feed of the ANN7 news studio and who spoke to me said "their studio looks crap and there seems to be a swimming pool in front of the news anchor".

In a few frames ANN7 showed the construction of the news studio's sets by using time-lapse photography:

Africa News Network 7 (ANN7) will launch on MultiChoice's DStv on 21 August as South Africa's 3rd 24-hour TV news channel.

Africa News Network 7, or ANN7 will start on MultiChoice's DStv channel 405 as I've already reported, on 21 August, the new TV news channel from Infinity Media announced today.

ANN7 which embarked on a massive recruitment drive for staff - including technical crew as well as on-air talent as TV with Thinus reported in June, has already attracted some top level on-air talent such as Chantal Rutter Dros from M-Net's Carte Blanche investigative news magazine show who will be a primetime news anchor on ANN7.

It means that a massive TV news tsunami is heading South African viewers' way - but only for those who can pay. South Africa's TV news wars for eyeballs will intensify as the existing and well-regarded eNCA (DStv 403) in one month gets more competition from the addition of both SABC News (DStv 404) and ANN 7 (DStv 405).

All three South African TV news channels are however only viewable on DStv, leaving On Digital Media's TopTV out in the cold, as well as ordinary SABC license fee paying viewers on free-to-air who don't have access to subscription television.

While Chantal Rutter Dros will be the anchor of ANN7 Headlines and ANN7 Prime, she will be joined by another former M-Netter such as Gerry Rantseli-Elsdon who will be the presenter of Vuka Africa.

They are two of the over 150 people now attached to the ANN7 news channel which will make its debut on Wednesday 21 August from what ANN7 calls "the most technologically advanced news channel in South Africa".

ANN7 boasts that it will have "the latest newsroom automation systems, cutting edge electronic news gathering technology and a network of sharp, young journalists and experienced editors who will give a fresh perspective to the TV viewers of the country".

ANN7's 21 August launch comes shortly after the SABC relaunched their attempt at a 24-hour TV news channel following the failure of SABC News International in 2010 when SABC News (DStv 404) started last week.

SABC News, eNCA (DStv 403) and now ANN7 means that South Africa's TV news channels have jumped in one month from one to three.

ANN7 will bring South African viewers news and politics, sports, business and entertainment news.

The ANN7's website at www.ann7.com quietly went live a few weeks ago as the news team started a testing dry-run for the upcoming launch. The ANN7 website will try to lure viewers in online, similar to the eNCA's website at www.enca.com.

Other TV talent who will be seen on ANN7 from the news channel's headquarters in Midrand include Arthur Mafokate who will be the presenter of a new weekly flagship ANN7 sports programme entitled Hola Weekend and Jimmy Manyi who will be doing a weekly hard talk show Straight Talk similar to the BBC World News' HARDtalk and the eNCA's Justice Factor.

"I am looking forward to presenting viewers with a channel that is unique in its profile and choice of programmes," says Nazeem Howa, the director at Infinity Media which is launching ANN7 to the tune of millions of rands, in a press statement.

"We look forward to welcoming ANN7 onto our DStv platform," says Collins Khumalo, MultiChoice South Africa CEO in the statement.

ANN7 will be available from 21 August on DStv Premium, DStv Compact, DStv Extra, DStv Family and DStv Access.

Chantal Rutter Dros drops Carte Blanche to become the new primetime news anchor of ANN7's new primetime shows ANN7 Headlines, ANN7 Prime.

Carte Blanche presenter Chantal Rutter Dros is leaving M-Net for the new South African TV news channel Africa News Network 7 or ANN7 (DStv 405) which will be starting on MultiChoice's DStv satellite pay-TV platform on 21 August.

Chantal Rutter Dros is leaving M-Net's weekly investigative news magazine produced by Combined Artists Productions to become the prime time news anchor of the new ANN7 primetime shows ANN7 Headlines and ANN7 Prime.

The launch of ANN7 comes weeks after the SABC launched SABC News (DStv 404), which suddenly takes South African TV news channels from one - eNCA (DStv 403) - to three within three weeks.

UPDATE 10 Aug 19:00 - This story has been amended and three sentences from this point on, down, deleted, to correct an error I made where I made a mistake and reported that Chantal Rutter Dros' prime time anchor work presents quite an interesting challenge.

Where you read this now, this story noted that Chantal Rutter Dros is a mother to be; she is in fact not pregnant. Sincere apologies to Chantal Rutter Dros for the unintentional mistake.

BREAKING. ANN7 is hiring! Africa News Network 7, South Africa's new 24-hour TV news channel is looking for TV talent.

Fix up those CV's people, Africa News Network 7 or ANN7 - the new South African 24-hour TV news channel - is now hiring!

ANN7 which plans to start broadcasting later this year as a new TV news channel on MultiChoice's DStv platform as a competitor to eNCA (DStv 403) is now looking for presenters, reporters, anchors, sound engineers, producers and cameramen for its news broadcasts - a massive recruitment drive which might see top TV talent hop from competitors.

The past months TV with Thinus has received numerous enquiries from South Africans in media and broadcasting asking where they can make contact with, send CV's to, or possibly apply for positions at the new TV news channel - the lastest email asking about this I received two days ago. Now there is an answer.

ANN7 which will be run by by Infinity Media - a joint venture between Essel Media, Oakbay Investments (Oakbay Investments is the majority shareholder in The New Age newspaper) and a black economic empowerment group - is busy constructing new TV news headquarters in Midrand which will house ANN7's news studio fascilities and is now looking at starting to fill on-air positions as well as staffing up behind the camera.

ANN7's massive media talent recruitment drive comes as other South African media houses and newspapers are downsizing and merging newsroom operations. The move is bringing a sudden injection of new jobs within the electronic media sphere to the country's pressured media industry where jobs are few and far between.

Besides anchors and presenters ANN7 is also looking for TV reporters, video editors, producers, audio engineers, engineers, camera operators, graphic designers, assignment desk editors, and even an online producer who will all produce news bulletins and current affairs and work in the 24/7 newsroom under constant deadline pressures.

ANN7 which will broadcast news in English, is now also accepting applications and CV's for on-air personnel who will work in Midrand, Johannesburg and salaries are negotiable.

"Candidates must have excellent English communication skills and a good news sense," says ANN7. "Good communication skills in other languages will be an added advantage."

Applicants must also be skilled in television presenting and exude a "pleasant, charming personality" and be "hardworking, passionate and enthusiastic".

ANN7 requires candidates who want to be TV presenters to have a minimum of three years' experience in the television industry.

Interested people can contact ANN7 and Margriet on 011 542 1222 and send email to hr01@ann7.co.za

South Africa has a very small pool of experienced, qualified and skilled TV presenters and even less telegenic presenters and reporters who are specifically skilled in live TV news delivery. Behind the scenes, skilled technicians, journalists and producers in South Africa are as hard to find, which often lead to the poaching of existing talent between competitors. 

The major ANN7 talent recruitment drive will likely see some well-known TV faces leave existing TV channels and news operations to hop to the new channel.

It's not yet known when ANN7 will start with test transmissions and when the news channel will go live later this year. The SABC planned a similar restart of a 24-hour news channel after the SABC News International channel was shut down, but after multiple launch attempts failed, the public broadcaster shelved the plan.

Africa News Network 7 or ANN7 on DStv will help with local news diversity in South Africa; be 'heavily focused' on local news, says MultiChoice CEO.

Imtiaz Patel, group CEO of MultiChoice South Africa, says that the Africa News Network 7 - or ANN7 - the planned new 24-hour South African news channel which debut in the middle of this year on MultiChoice's DStv platform (although a specific starting date like August is not fixed) will be heavily focused on local content and local news.

He says that ANN7 will aid diversity and news plurality in the country, that it will most likely be available on all of DStv's bouquets and stresses that MultiChoice is not giving the channel any money.

News about the proposed new local 24-hour news channel from Infinity Media, which would replace the SABC's constantly delayed but planned 24-hour news channel on DStv broke last week.

It will be called the Africa News Network 7 or ANN7 for short. Interestingly, almost nobody in South Africa's TV industry knew anything about the start-up of a new 24-hour local TV news channel.

On Saturday I spoke with Imtiaz Patel from MultiChoice in South Africa to get the latest and correct facts on  ANN7, MultiChoice's proposed plans about it, and why the satellite pay-TV operator wants to add this channel.


Imtiaz, when would Africa News Network 7 or ANN7 be launching? August?

Imtiaz Patel: I don't get involved in the detail but from a very high level I can tell you that the plan is to launch around then, maybe slightly earlier, maybe a bit later. There's always ongoing discussions with the content people and it depends on their plans and the building of studios. A lot depends on the many different variables.


Why another local 24-hour channel on DStv? What will make it different or will DStv through that new channel bring to DStv subscribers?
Imtiaz Patel: Firstly, from MultiChoice, we like to give our subscribers diversity. Secondly we've got a number of international news channels - BBC World News, CNN International, Al Jazeera, Euronews. We've only got one local news channel [eNCA]. 
Number three, you know that local content is lekker. Local content is becoming a big thing in broadcasting. If you look at Radio 702, South Africans want to know what is happening in their communities, they want to know what is happening in their provinces, in their cities. The proposition that they've presented is that they're going to be heavily focused on local coverage. 
They're willing to invest a lot of money in local content and local is a big thing. That helps to bring more diversity. We already have one local 24-hour news channel and another one will give viewers and subscribers more diversity.
Ultimately, remember, as with all of our TV channels we have performance clauses. The channels we have ultimately have to perform. After a year - after a period of time and giving people enough time - you do a review, and if a channel don't perform we take action.


Do you know yet whether Africa News Network 7 will only be a premium TV channel? Will it only be for DStv Premium or what bouquets?
Imtiaz Patel: No Thinus that is not correct. It will probably go for all of the DStv bouquets. 


What assistance is DStv giving the channel? Is there financial assistance?
Imtiaz Patel: No. We're not paying for the channel. Obviously we'll do the usual guidance for the channel when they come for reviews and things, we will give them our usual guidance which is what we do with everybody.


Okay. A very open ended question and you might be able to guess why I'm asking it, but does MultiChoice support any kind of political ideology or political party?

Imtiaz Patel: Absolutely not. Absolutely not. Categorically no. We're a bouquet of channels and ultimately we're a platform. We do not get involved in editorial policy and we never will get involved in any editorial policy.We want to give our viewers a diversity of views, content. It would be like saying we like sci-fi and therefore we will have more sci-fi movies channels instead of romance movie channels. No way. No.

When this news broke, as a journalist I immediately asked people and none of them knew, and I think other people were as surprised. Nobody that I talked to knew anything about this. How long ago did you start negotiations or did you begin talking about Africa News Network 7?
Imtiaz Patel: The first presentation was made to us long ago. About two years ago already, you know. It was on and off and on and off, that kind of thing. Remember we also didn't have the capacity at that time satellite wise. There's a lot of factors which have an influence and which change from time to time like very practical issues - we launched the new satellite only in October.


The last question, is there possibly just anything that DStv can please say or just clarify as to why the SABC's planned 24-hour news channel will now not be happening anymore on DStv. That's my last question.
Imtiaz Patel: Thinus, it was intended to happen. We have never publicly, officially announced anything, so we can't say it's not going to happen if we never said that it was going to happen. So we never announced anything like it was on. We were in discussions with them and they had discussions with us. They intended to do it. But there's lots of issues of course, like financing of the channel and a million of other things. But you need to ask the SABC that.

BREAKING. ANN7 - Africa News Network 7 - the new 24-hour South African news channel to be added to DStv towards the middle of 2013.

ANN7 - standing for Africa News Network 7 - is the name of the planned new 24-hour TV news channel from Infinity Media which MultiChoice will be adding to its DStv platform towards the middle of 2013.

MultiChoice will add ANN7 presumably around August, and presumably on the currently vacant channel number 404 where the SABC's new constantly delayed 24-hour TV channel was supposed to go.

Staffing of ANN7 and filling key positions of Africa News Network 7 will start soon.

Infinity Media - a joint venture between Essel Media, Oakbay Investments (Oakbay Investments is the majority shareholder in The New Age newspaper) and a black economic empowerment group - will set up and run ANN7 in South Africa.

Essel Media runs Zee TV, India's largest broadcaster.

Infinity Media will create ANN7's studio fascilities in Midrand from where the channel will create its news channel feed for South Africa and broadcast for 24 hours per day.


ALSO READ: A new 24-hour South African TV news channel launching on DStv later in the year.
ALSO READ: News Age? The planned new 24-hour TV news channel which was even news to me.
ALSO READ: As DStv lose the ill-conceived planned 24-hour news channel from the SABC in exchange for a new New Age 24-hour news channel, the SABC's plans remain but a dream.