According to HN daily, Minister of Interior and Informatics Ivan Langer prepared new law, which should speed up the nationwide change from analogue to digital TV. One of the options is to return advertisements back to Czech TV digital channels (currently CT24 and CT4), should the launch of project is delayed. If TV Nova and TV Prima voluntary give up their analogue licences to broadcast until 2017-2018, the new law will grant them one or two new licenses as a compensation. The interior Minister added that if the planned launch of digital TV does not turn out to be realistic, there should be discussion on returning advertising to the main public Czech TV channels. Alternatively, the money could go toward the filmmaking fund and digital broadcasting. TV Nova and Prima would also have to pay twice as much for the use of each transmitter.
Our view:
Although we see overall the news of returning advertisements on Czech TV digital channels as slightly negative, we believe that this change would be done only after consultation with TV Nova and TV Prima, which both have a strong negotiation position, and ultimately can block the ministerial plan in court. Further, the ratings of Czech TV digital channels are rather small, therefore advertisement buyers are not likely to switch their budgets on any larger scale. Overall, we expect the news to have neutral impact.