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ISTANBUL: The Turkish conglomerate Ciner Group has agreed to a $402 million deal to acquire the local broadcaster Show TV. The station was acquired by Ciner from Savings Deposit Insurance Fund (TMSF), which had seized some of the assets of Çukurova Group in May. Çukurova had failed to make payments …

COLOGNE: 360TuneBox is a new 24-hour music service from SPI International, which has launched the channel in the Czech Republic and Slovakia and plans to enter further territories this summer. Targeting young, urban, middle-class adults, 360TuneBox promises to go beyond the mainstream array of popular artists to play a variety …

LONDON: BBC In-House Entertainment and The Jim Henson Company have teamed up for The Puppet Game Show, a Saturday night prime-time event. There are eight 45-minute episodes being co-produced for BBC One to debut later this year. Each week, two celebrities will go head to head in a number of …

COLOGNE: Magine is delivering its subscription cloud-based TV service in beta format in Germany this month. The service brings cloud-based live TV, catch-up and on-demand programming together in the same place. Its first edition launched in Swedish homes in March, featuring the national Swedish broadcasters SVT and TV4 as well as …

LOS ANGELES: Rive Gauche Television has sold the competition series Race to the Scene to Viasat for broadcast in Scandinavia and other Eastern European territories. Race to the Scene will air via Viasat networks in Denmark, Norway, Sweden, the Czech Republic, Latvia, Lithuania and Bulgaria. Presented by action film star Dolph Lundgren, the 8×1-hour …

NEW YORK: Louise Pedersen, the managing director of ALL3MEDIA International, talks to TV Europe about the company’s increased focus on drama, digital media and the U.S. market. TV EUROPE: ALL3MEDIA has always had a strong drama slate, but recently it has gotten even bigger. What has been your drama strategy? PEDERSEN: …

DENVER: Liberty Global has now received all the necessary shareholder approvals, regulatory approvals and other customary closing conditions to complete its acquisition of Virgin Media. The stock and cash merger is valued at $24 billion. Mike Fries, the president and CEO of Liberty Global, said, “This is a great day …

DUBLIN: Jeff Ford, formerly the director of programs at Channel 5 and now head of content at TV3 in Ireland, felt the quality of the pilots at the L.A. Screenings was good, but there was no breakthrough show this year. “There really wasn’t the standout that we had last year …

BUDAPEST: Chello Central Europe has acquired more than 200 hours of first-run and library drama programming from Power for its Film Mania channel in Hungary and Film Café channel in Romania and Hungary. A slate of movies from Power are headed to Film Mania, while the mini-series package is for …

LONDON: The period comedy series Blandings, adapted from the PG Wodehouse books by Guy Andrews, is returning for a second season on BBC One in 2014. Produced by Mammoth Screen, Blandings centers on the lives of Lord Emsworth (a.k.a. Clarence) and his sister Connie. The 7×30-minute production is filmed in …