Posted on 07/30/2002 2:02:46 PM PDT by GeneD
BEIJING, July 30 (Reuters) - Viacom chief Sumner Redstone is trying to get permission to show a 24-hour Mandarin MTV music channel over cable systems in the rich southern Chinese province of Guangdong, industry sources said on Tuesday.
"They are pitching very, very hard to have the landing rights of MTV," said an executive at a rival media group in Beijing, referring to MTV China, one of eight channels MTV broadcasts in Asia.
By getting rights to broadcast MTV China in Guangdong, the U.S.-based media giant would gain access to China's tightly regulated cable television market comparable to early birds News Corp and AOL Time Warner.
MTV, a Viacom unit, broadcasts the channel to a limited audience in China made up of some luxury hotels and foreigner-approved residences and shows it in hourly blocks on 50 or 60 cable systems in 45 provinces and cities.
MTV also holds annual Asian music awards with national broadcaster China Central Television (CCTV), which will air the fourth annual CCTV-MTV Music Honours next month after taping the star-studded show in Beijing last Friday.
But Viacom, which owns Paramount Pictures and U.S. network CBS, wants to put MTV into ordinary homes in China, where 80-100 million homes have cable television.
Only three foreign 24-hour channels have been allowed to do that in China, where analysts say the Communist Party is still reluctant to give up control of the media, a key propaganda tool.
NICKELODEON TOO?
Last year, China gave AOL Time Warner's CETV, News Corp's Star TV and Phoenix Satellite TV -- 38 percent-owned by News Corp -- permission to broadcast via cable operators in the affluent southern province of Guangdong.
In May, Frank Brown, president of Singapore-based MTV Networks Asia, said his company hoped for 24-hour access to Chinese homes.
"It's a hard slot," said one western businessman at a banquet for Chinese media officials Viacom hosted in Beijing on Monday.
Even harder would be two slots.
Another Beijing executive at a foreign broadcaster said Redstone, chairman and chief executive of Viacom, was also pushing China to open the Guangdong up to Viacom's children's channel Nickelodeon.
"He's pushing for the Nickelodeon channel and the MTV channel to be allowed access in Guangdong Province -- equal treatment with AOL Time Warner and News Corp," said the executive.
Last year, Viacom said it began showing half-hour blocks of Nickelodeon programmes to 40 million Chinese households via cable systems.
"If either one gets there, he'll be happy. But he's pushing for both," said the executive, who asked not to be identified.
Redstone, 79, who travels to Beijing annually as do most media tycoons seeking greater access in China, was expected to meet Chinese President Jiang Zemin on Wednesday, industry sources said.
Copyright 2002, Reuters News Service
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