TVI � Televis�o Independente

World Screen Weekly, June 22, 2006

CHANNEL NAME: TVI — 
Televisão Independente, Portugal

LAUNCH DATE: February 20, 1993

OWNERSHIP: Grupo Media Capital, whose major shareholders are Grupo PRISA and the RTL Group, each with a 33-percent stake.

DESCRIPTION: TVI is mainly distributed as a free-to-air terrestrial channel, but some cable and satellite distribution enables it to reach more than 95 percent of the Portuguese market.

GENERAL MANAGER: Jose Eduardo Moniz

PROGRAMMING STRATEGY: In 1999, TVI embarked on a major revision of its program strategy. “TVI has striven to be an avowedly Portuguese station with a predominance of local programming made by Portuguese people, for Portuguese people,” says Jose Eduardo Moniz, TVI’s general manager. “TVI has positioned itself as the market leader for innovation, audacity, independence and the ability to surprise, along with an underpinning of traditional Portuguese culture and the social standards of a modern society.” From Monday to Friday, TVI seeks to air only home-grown fare between 7:00 a.m. and midnight, and places heavy emphasis on local production in prime time, which in Portugal is 8 p.m. to midnight. “Consequently,” says Moniz, “although acquired programming makes up a little over 24 percent of our schedule, it is aired on some weekend afternoons and in late night.” The bulk of TVI’s acquisitions are from the U.S.

About 22 percent of TVI’s schedule is made up of locally produced fiction, almost all of which is made by NBP, a subsidiary of Grupo Media Capital. Most of this drama production consists of original scripted series and serials as well as format deals, overwhelmingly of telenovelas. In total, NBP produces around 800 hours a year for TVI and generally has three series running at any one time. “The focus of our drama,” Moniz says, “is to bring viewers closer to Portugal’s history and culture by enabling them to identify closely with the daily themes of everyday life. This is an overarching goal of all of TVI’s drama, irrespective of the storyline of any given series.” As examples, Moniz cites the youth telenovela Morangos com a��car, as well as the older skewing novela Dei-te quase tudo, which, as Moniz explains, “not only follows the story of two lovers, but is also deeply rooted in Portugal’s recent history.”

TVI was the station that introduced Portuguese people to reality television when it aired its first season of Big Brother in 2000 to much success. Reality now occupies an important place in the TVI schedule with the station having aired three new series in the first quarter of this year, including O meu odioso e inacredit�vel noivo, a local adaptation of FOX’s My Big Fat Obnoxious Fianc�.

TVI is Portugal’s most-watched news broadcaster, averaging a 35 percent audience share this year. News accounts for around 21 percent of the schedule. The channel also has a two-year deal for the Superliga, the country’s premiere football league, from which it broadcasts 30 games per year.

WHAT’S NEW: “In the coming months TVI will be launching two cable and satellite channels,” Moniz says. “The Portuguese government is also taking another look at the question of digital terrestrial television (DTT). This is certainly something that we would like to be involved in. In fact, we are keeping a very close eye on all the opportunities that are being opened up by the arrival of digital.”

WEBSITE: www.tvi.iol.pt

— Bob Jenkins