The shutdown of the embattled Econet keeps rippling as it abruptly shutters its whole Econet Media division which includes Kwesé iflix as latest victim.

The expanding shutdown of the embattled Econet's divisions keeps rippling through the embattled business with Econet that has now abruptly shuttered its whole Econet Media division as well, that includes its Kwesé iflix streaming service as apparently the latest victim of its cash-crunch.

The debt-laden Econet that has not paid retrenched staffers their severance money and told them it doesn't know when it will be able to, has seen its Kwese TV pay-TV division abruptly shut down and placed into liquidation, its TV channels like Kwesé Free Sports abruptly go dark and off air without warning, and its Kwesé Play streaming service and Roku-device terminated.

Now Econet,owned by the Zimbabwean billionaire Strive Masiyiwa, has been forced to shut down its entire Econet Media subsidiary where Joseph Hundah has been Econet Media CEO and that racked up more than $130 million in debt in content costs including expensive sports rights and other services, with Econet Media that housed Kwesé TV, Kwesé Play and Kwesé Iflix.

The Econet Group in a statement says that "The Econet Group regrets to confirm that Econet Media Limited has ceased operations with effect from 5 August 2019".

"It is a difficult decision that we could not postpone. Over the last 4 years we sought to disrupt Africa’s media landscape and enable Africa to tell its own stories using a variety of technologies including satellite broadcast, video streaming and free-to-air TV."

"The Econet Group invested heavily into Econet Media and supported the business over the period it operated without any third-party funding. Unfortunately, market conditions and content price inflation got in the way of us completing our mission."

"We are particularly grateful to all our dedicated staff and contractors who have worked tirelessly to bring a great product to market and who until the last day believed in the Kwesé story. We are also grateful to our customers and our partners who believed in the Kwesé vision and who worked with us as we tried to change how Africans consume and pay for media."

"We deeply regret the impact that this decision has had on our staff, contractors, customers, regulators and content providers."

"We will engage with each of our valued stakeholders transparently and will seek to meet our obligations to each of them as provided under law."

"The Econet Group is entrepreneurial and believes in Africa and its potential. Our belief in 'an inclusive connected future that leaves no African behind' remains undaunted."

"We would like to emphasise and reiterate that the rest of the Econet Group businesses continue to operate normally as each of our companies are separate legal entities with their own management teams and boards."

In its statement, Econet mentions nothing about its alleged bad management, rapid and aggressive expansion plans and cash splurges, bad and often non-existent customer care and foolish content acquisition strategies that were all self-inflicted damage that led to Econet Media's downfall and implosion. 

Econet said in July that its beleaguered pay-TV and TV business struggled to compete with China's StarTimes and MultiChoice's DStv.

Meanwhile several current and former South African workers of Econet who are enduring living hell but who were once "promised heaven" if they join Kwesé TV, showed TVwithThinus correspondence of them not having been paid their severance packages after being retrenched and Econet executives telling them that there isn't money and that they can't give answers as to when they will be paid.


ALSO READ: Embattled Econet announces it will be shutting down its struggling Kwesé TV entirely on Monday 5 August 2019 after owing R1.9 billion to third-party content providers.
ALSO READ: Living hell after Kwesé implosion: Massive problems, fear, secrecy, non-payment and scared staffers at Econet Kwesé TV in South Africa where workers were once "promised heaven".

Former M-Net and Econet's Kwesé TV exec Pierre Cloete jumps to BBC Studios as new commercial director for the set of BBC channels in South Africa and Africa.

Pierre Cloete, a former M-Net boss at MultiChoice and Econet's Kwesé TV former Kwesé Sports boss has jumped to BBC Studios where he has been appointed as the new commercial director for the set of BBC channels that BBC Studios runs in South Africa and across sub-Saharan Africa, known as its "branded services".

"Branded services" is how BBC Studios describes its portfolio of BBC branded channels - BBC Brit, BBC Lifestyle, BBC First, BBC Earth, CBeebies, and BBC World News which it supplies to MultiChoice's DStv satellite pay-TV service in South Africa and Africa, with BBC World News that's also available on China's StarTimes's elsewhere in Africa and its StarSat in South Africa, eMedia Investment's Openview and the Cell C black video streaming service. 

Pierre Cloete's role and responsibility in the role of commercial director for branded services for sub-Saharan Africa will be around delivering on the revenues, profit and growth for the set of BBC branded channels across sub-Saharan Africa, and working with existing partners and exploring new business development opportunities.

His appointment comes after BBC Studios's restructuring of its Central Europe, Middle East and Africa (CEMA) region that has left South Africa and Africa without any hands-on in-country boss and that saw the abrupt exit of BBC Africa boss Joel Churcher in July 2019 after 5 years.

Continuing to be based in Johannesburg, South Africa and reporting into BBC Africa's advertising boss Louise La Grange, who is the senior vice president of branded services commercial, Pierre Cloete will start on 1 September 2019.

 Pierre Cloete is jumping ship from the struggling Econet's imploding Kwese TV pay-TV operation in Zimbabwe and South Africa where he most recently was Kwesé Sports acting CEO and the head of Kwesé Sports Digital Content.

Before this Pierre Cloete was at Ericsson South Africa for 2 years as head of TV and media, and before that worked for 8 years at M-Net.

Before joining MultiChoice in the SuperSport division, Pierre Cloete started his TV industry career with the Johannesburg-based production company Rapid Blue, which has ironically grown to become BBC Studios Africa's preferred production partner on current and upcoming series ranging from Come Dine with Me South Africa to First Dates South Africa.

"The appointment of a commercial director for Sub-Saharan Africa signals our ongoing commitment to the market and a continued local presence on the ground," says Louise La Grange in a supplied statement on Monday.

"Pierre has a proven track record in the African television industry and I am confident that his experience and local knowledge will put BBC Studios in the best position to achieve our ambitions for growth."

Pierre Cloete in a supplied quote says "I am delighted to join BBC Studios as commercial director for Branded Services across sub-Saharan Africa".

"The quality of the BBC channels and its content is first class, and it is an honour to join the BBC Studios team."

"Africa is filled with amazing people that enjoy great stories and love quality content. The potential is ever increasing in Africa as more stories are being told and consumed and I look forward to adding value to the BBC Studios team."

Premier Soccer League (PSL) agrees to extend the deadline for bids for broadcasting rights after the SABC asks for an extension.

The SABC has asked the Premier Soccer League (PSL) to extend the bid deadline for broadcasting rights so the public broadcaster can put together a possible tender offer and the PSL has agreed to extend the deadline.

The broadcasting rights are up for the Premier Soccer League in Sub-Saharan Africa for the 2019 to 2024 season.

So far it's been held by MultiChoice's SuperSport for the past decade after the SABC failed to put in a bid 10 years ago when its existing deal expired and the public broadcaster lost the rights.

Currently the SABC sub-licensed broadcasting rights so that public access broadcasting viewers can see some of the matches.

PSL chairperson Irvin Khoza on Wednesday after the league's annual general meeting in Sandton revealed that the PSL decided to extend the deadline for bids after the SABC requested more time.

Last week the SABC in parliament was asked whether it would be putting in a bid for the PSL broadcasting rights and told parliament's portfolio committee on communications that it would put together and submit a tender.

The PSL put out the broadcasting rights tender at the beginning of this month with an original deadline of 10 November.

"We briefed the members of PSL about the broadcasting rights which were supposed to be finalized on Wednesday but we've had to extend the deadline until Friday."

"This was prompted by SABC asking for an extra week because of the appointment of its new board. We gave them that extension to make sure that they get the equal chance."

"But what was also unique was that this time around we got applications from Vodacom‚ Telkom and Kwesé Sports. So it will be quite interesting to see what will be the outcome of these bids."

The PSL broadcasting rights include linear television - both pay-TV and public broadcasting, IPTV, internet streaming and mobile broadcasting of league matches.

SABC and SuperSport given the Olympic Games and Winter Olympics broadcasting rights for South Africa until 2024.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has awarded the Olympic Games free-to-air and pay-TV broadcasting rights for South Africa to the SABC and to SuperSport for the next two Olympic Games and the Winter Olympics.

The SABC to free-to-air viewers, and SuperSport to MultiChoice's DStv subscribers, will broadcast the Winter Games PyeongChang 2018, the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020, the Olympic Winter Games Beijing 2022 and the Olympic Games in 2024.

SuperSport was given the pay-TV rights in South Africa and Sub-Saharan Africa, with the SABC given the free-to-air broadcasting rights in South Africa. Econet Media gets the free-to-air rights in Sub-Saharan Africa, as well as pay-TV broadcasting rights as well for its Kwesé Sports channels, where it will compete with SuperSport for viewers.

According to the agreement the SABC will have to broadcast at least 200 hours of live or same day coverage of each edition of the Olympic Games and faily highlights of the Olympic Winter Games.

SuperSport will have to work with the IOC to support the development of the Olympic Channel, including the production of localised content and linear distribution across Africa.

"As long-time partners of the OIC, SuperSport is delighted to have secured these excellent Olympic rights," says Gideon Khobane, SuperSport CEO.

"The Games produce consistently good ratings, no doubt because of the non-stop drama and action that make for compelling viewing. We look forward to putting together a multi-platform, multi-channel offering that will reflect the Olympics in their full glory".

Sully Motsweni, the SABC's head of SABC Sport says "there are many live events that SABC Sport brings to millions of South Africans every day, but none comes close to the triumph of Olympic spirit and the ultimate objective of winning gold as our athletes represent South Africa on a global stage".

Habu Gumel, OIC member for broadcasting rights in Africa says "we are pleased to be able to continue our longstanding partnerships with DStv, SuperSport and the SABC".

A MIND-BOGGLING CLUSTER. How South African viewers got to see the Joshua/Klitschko boxing match - and the losers and winners of this intricate sports rights bout unpacked.

It was a title fight, it was international sport, it was knock-out, must-see TV - and in South Africa viewers saw it on a channel starting with a capital "S".

No, not SuperSport but two small community TV stations called SowetoTV and 1KZN.

A very interesting part of the story of the incredible and utterly electrifying Saturday night boxing match between Anthony Joshua and Wladimir Klitschko at England's national stadium was how South Africans thankfully got to see it while DStv subscribers across the rest of Africa didn't.

Cue the increasingly getting crazier sports broadcasting rights battles.

With SuperSport not having the rights to the boxing match of the year so far, DStv subscribers across Africa vented their shock and anger at MultiChoice and SuperSport on Saturday night after not being able to see the Joshua Klitschko match up.

The same almost happened to South African viewers and DStv subscribers - were it not for an utterly insane South African television first that has never happened before and which still seems so complicated and completely impossible, that it's hard to believe it really happened this way.

Follow the sheer incredulous insanity:

It turns out that two small South African (1) community TV channels somehow managed to acquire the broadcasting rights to the Anthony Joshua and Wladimir Klitschko fight from a (2) pay-TV provider competing against MultiChoice and SuperSport.

As if this wasn't eye-popping enough, this content then ended up showing on, and viewers seeing it, not on one but (3) two other competing pay-TV providers since the community channels have national carriage agreements with both.

In short:

Kagiso Media that runs community TV channels like SowetoTV and 1KZN somehow acquired the Joshua/Klitschko fight from Kwesé Sports. That then ended up being seen by viewers on DStv - but not on SuperSport - and also on StarSat, since StarSat also carries 1KZN.

Talk about the most epic cluster get-together "huh?" you've probably ever seen when it comes to sports rights in South Africa.

Of course neither Kagiso Media, SowetoTV, 1KZN, MultiChoice or StarSat issued any press release beforehand or any programming advisory to the media about the fight, that it will be shown, or where viewers and their pay-TV subscribers would be able to see it and what time.

A lot of quite random things conspired to make the Joshua/Klitschko fight broadcast in South Africa worthy of an academic dissertation when it comes to the broadcasting industry and sports rights.

Kwesé and MultiChoice are competing rivals as are Kwesé Sports and SuperSport. Under normal circumstances the Joshua/Klitschko bout that wasn't on SuperSport, shouldn't even have been seen on DStv at all.

Did Kwesé even know or do due diligence and its homework to know that the small community TV stations run by Kagiso Media it sold the boxing match rights to, is also carried on both DStv and on StarSat?

In South Africa, Econet Media and its Kwesé Sports turns out to be the biggest loser in the biggest heavyweight fight in British history, with SuperSport as the smaller loser.

But, besides Anthony Joshua as the biggest winner, there's several other big winners:

The first biggest winner is the South African viewer, getting to see a great boxing match they really in a sense shouldn't have seen, technically.

On another differentiator, when it comes to pay-TV viewers, lower-tiered subscribers on both DStv and StarSat also got access to premium upper-tier content that they won't normally have access to - another win for viewers..

The second really big winner is SowetoTV and 1KZN. SowetoTV especially got glowing praise from viewers.

Not only did SowetoTV, displaying the KFS LIVE (Kwese Free Sports) content marker in the screen corner, lure stacks of viewers (which will translate into a huge ratings bump), but those viewers also had huge positive things to say about Soweto TV.

Besides getting many first-time viewers to sample the channel - of which undoubtedly some will return - the premium content and premium sports content also gave Soweto TV (and to a smaller extent 1KZN) more brand prominence and prestige.

This was true content marketing where the acquired content marketed itself, and by proxy Soweto TV, driving viewers and sports viewers to SowetoTV.

The third winner is MultiChoice. Although the very big boxing match wasn't on SuperSport, it was still on DStv and accessible through DStv.

Although on two lesser tuned-to DStv channels, DStv still had it and showed it - it was just an issue of viewers having to flip through mostly unknown channel numbers and uncharted channel territory to find it.

The fourth winner is On Digital Media (ODM) and StarTimes Media South Africa's StarSat.

StarSat coasting in the wake like a remora next to a shark, did utterly nothing to deserve it but since it has 1KZN on its channels line-up as part of a channel carriage deal, all StarSat subscribers that wanted to, also got the ability to see the Joshua/Klitschko fight.

StarSat however didn't lift as much as a finger to get the opportunity to show this premium TV sports event, but got to bask in the knock-on effect spoils.

South African terrestrial and pay-TV viewers should be glad that (a) SowetoTV and 1KZN managed to get the rights and (b) that these channels happened to be carried nationally on MultiChoice's DStv, and also on StarSat.

One last interesting observation: The sad SABC that's basically given up on securing sports rights for almost anything and StarSat both continue to complain bitterly that sports rights are tied up exclusively by MultiChoice and SuperSport and that they can't make any inroads.

Total bullshit. A small community TV station managed to do better, and to outdo both the bedlam South African public broadcaster and StarSat.

Crazy as it sounds, SowetoTV just proved in its knockout Joshua/Klitschko acquisition, that it is possible to get certain big, premium sports rights.