STAR, Asia’s leading media and entertainment company, has launched four channels on Rogers Cable, leading cable operator in Canada - while three are Hindi language services, one is Tamil.
This will be followed by three Mandarin-language services later this month.
“Rogers has long been committed to delivering the most variety and choice of multicultural programming to Canadians,” said David Purdy, Vice President of TV and Video Product Management, Rogers Cable.
“The South Asian and Chinese communities are extremely important to us and we are pleased to be delivering even more valued content to our customers.”
The bouquet of channels offered by STAR, wholly owned subsidiary of News Corporation, include STAR One, Bollywood movie channel STAR India Gold and news channel STAR India News as well as popular Tamil entertainment channel STAR Vijay.
These four channels are an addition to STAR India Plus, which has been available on ATN’s services in Canada since 2006. The Mandarin language channels will be from STAR Greater China’s bouquet.
“This launch marks the debut of 24-hour STAR channels in Canada and makes STAR the largest provider of foreign television services to Rogers’ viewers. Now Canadian audiences will have seven new 24-hour channels from which to find fresh favourites, to entertain, inform and inspire,” said David Wisnia, STAR’s Senior Vice President of Distribution, Sales and Marketing and head of STAR’s North American and European offices, in a press statement.
The channels will be available as part of Rogers’ multicultural package offerings.
Later this month, three popular Mandarin-language channels from STAR Greater China’s bouquet will also make their Canadian debut. The channels consist of STAR CHINESE CHANNEL (general entertainment), STAR CHINESE MOVIES 2 (Chinese films) and Taiwan’s trend setting music and lifestyle channel, CHANNEL [V] Taiwan.
Shan Chandrasekar, the president and CEO of ATN, added that ATN, STAR and Rogers share a common vision of delivering variety and value to multi-cultural communities across Canada. “We are proud to sponsor these highly popular STAR services in Canada, as their top programs attract some of the biggest audiences in Asia.”
STAR is a leading media and entertainment company in Asia. STAR broadcasts over 60 television services in 13 languages to more than 300 million viewers across 53 Asian countries.
STAR and its joint venture channels cover all genres including general entertainment (Star Plus, Xing Kong, Star Chinese Channel, Star World, Star One, Star Utsav, Star Jalsha, Star Pravah, Vijay, Asianet, Asianet Plus, Sitara, Suvarna, antv, Phoenix Chinese Channel), sports (ESPN, Star Sports, Star Cricket), movies (Star Chinese Movies, Star Chinese Movies 2, Star Gold, Star Movies), music (Channel [V]), and news and current affairs (Star News, Star Ananda, Star Majha, Phoenix InfoNews Channel).
STAR controls over 20,000 hours of Indian and Chinese programming and also owns the world’s largest contemporary Chinese film library, with more than 600 titles, featuring superstars including Jackie Chan, Chow Yun Fat and Bruce Lee.
In partnership with leading companies, STAR businesses extend to filmed entertainment, television production, cable systems and distribution, direct-to-home services, terrestrial TV broadcasting,