Mediacorp

Mediacorp Pte Ltd, better known as Mediacorp, is a group of commercial media companies in Singapore, with business interests in television and radio broadcasting, interactive media, and, to a lesser extent, print publishing and filmmaking.

Currently, Mediacorp runs 7 television channels and 12 radio channels, making it the largest media broadcaster and provider in Singapore, and the only terrestrial TV broadcaster in the city-state. It is wholly owned by Temasek Holdings, a government-owned investment arm.

1935-1961: Beginnings in radio
The company group began with the advent of radio broadcasting in Singapore when the broadcasting licence was awarded to the British Malaya Broadcasting Corporation (BMBC) in 21 July 1935. The company officially opened its studios and transmitters at Caldecott Hill two years later in 1 March 1937. The corporation was taken over by the Straits Settlement government in 1940 as a part of the British Department of Information known as Malaya Broadcasting Corporation.

Not long after Singapore reached self-government status in 1959, there were plans to obtain television transmission rights. This manifested into the entity Television Singapura in 4 April 1961. Television Singapura began transmission tests from 21 January to 15 February 1963, where it was launched as Singapore's first television station and officially began broadcasting. Regular broadcasts there since 3 April (later known as Channel 5) were mainly in English and Malay. On 23 November of the same year, a second channel was launched as Channel 8, airing programmes mainly in Mandarin and Tamil.

Meanwhile in Kuala Lumpur, Talivishen Malaysia (new Malay orthography: Televisyen Malaysia) began broadcasting on 28 December in time for the New Year on the next year. Television Singapura was subsequently rebranded (also to coincide with the formation of Malaysia in September of that year) as sister channel "Television Malaysia (Singapura)". The first advertisement was aired on 1 January 1964 to reduce the station's reliance on subsidies.

1965-1980: Radio Television Singapore (RTS)
After the separation of Singapore from the Malaysian federation, all of the Television Malaysia operations in Singapore, and the radio stations, were joined together to become Radio and Television of Singapore (RTS). RTS was officially dissolved in 31 January 1980 by announcer David Gabriel, who declared its transition as a statutory board known as the Singapore Broadcasting Corporation (SBC) the next day.

1980-1994: Singapore Broadcasting Corporation
On 3 February 1980, SBC's flagship guide Radio and TV Times were printed for the very first time, becoming an important source of weekly radio and television programme schedules serving the island. First published in English and Mandarin, these magazines also served up local and international entertainment news and trivia. (They would eventually evolve to become magazines 8 Days and i-Weekly.

On 31 January 1984, SBC's third channel SBC 12 was launched. The decade also witnessed the launch of two radio stations: Perfect 10 (now known as 987FM) which was Singapore's first 24-hour radio station in 1989 and Y.E.S. 93.3FM, the first Mandarin music radio station. SBC began stereo broadcasting on all of its television channels on 1 August 1990.

A dedicated Educational television slot known as the CDIS began broadcasting solely on SBC Channel 12 on 4 January 1993. On 1 February of the same year SBC celebrated its 30 years of television broadcasting. On 7 June, SBC8 expanded its broadcasting hours on weekdays, from 3:00pm until closedown. On 1 December, SBC was the first broadcaster in Singapore to launch an international satellite television directed from Caldecott Hill and the Singapore International Foundation's regional broadcasting venture, Singapore International Television (SITV).

The SBC channels began a complete rebranding exercise as 1994 approached; beginning with Channel 5 launching its new look plus transferring of its Malay programming to Channel 12 on Saturday, 1 January 1994 at midnight. Channel 12 and Channel 8 completed their rebranding exercise on 1 February and 29 May 1994, respectively. On Monday, 29 August, Channel 5's flagship breakfast programme AM Singapore premiered as the first of its kind in the island.

1994-1999: Privatisation as the Television Corporation of Singapore
On 1 October 1994, SBC underwent a privatisation process into becoming a new holding group called the Singapore International Media Company Group (SIM, Chinese: 新加坡國際傳媒機構) helming three companies: Television Corporation of Singapore (TCS, Chinese: 新加坡電視機構), Radio Corporation of Singapore (RCS, Chinese: 新加坡廣播電台機構) and Singapore Television Twelve (STV12, Chinese: 新加坡電視12).

TCS 8 began 24-hour broadcasting on 1 September 1995 after almost 32 years. The channel began broadcasting 24 hours a day. On the same day, Singapore Television Twelve split the existing Channel 12 into 2 channels: Prime 12; a multilingual channel with programmes in Malay, Tamil, English and foreign languages were broadcast during primetime; and Premiere 12, highbrow channel that specialised in niche programming such as sports, arts, culture, documentaries and children's programming. Because of the restructure, Channel 8 became the first channel to broadcast 24 hours a day permanently and became the full-fledged Mandarin channel. At the same time, all Tamil programmes were being handed over to the newly re-launched TV12's main channel, Prime 12. Channel 5 became the second TV channel broadcast 24 hours a day, starting from 29 September 1995.

TCS launched its own film production studio Raintree Pictures on 1 August 1998. Singapore International Media (SIM) ceased operations on 31 December 1998 to become its current form Media Corporation of Singapore, or MediaCorp for short.

1999-2008: Formation of Mediacorp, rivalry with SPH Mediaworks, additional channels
On 1 March 1999, Mediacorp launched Channel NewsAsia (CNA) as Singapore's first national news channel, broadcasting on terrestrial analogue.

On 30 January 2000 Prime 12 and Premiere 12 were renamed Suria; and Central respectively. Suria became a full-fledged Malay channel while Central has its programming shared between children's programming from morning to early-evening, Tamil programmes during primetime and arts and cultural programmes at night. SportCity, a full-fledged sports channel was also launched on the same year.

Mediacorp's television monopoly was broken in 6 May 2001 when Singapore Press Holdings (SPH) were given a television broadcasting licence, resulting in SPH MediaWorks being established. MediaWorks offered two channels; the Chinese-language Channel U and English-language TV Works, which was later renamed to Channel i. At the same time, MediaCorp was given the license to print, write and distribute the free daily tabloid Today. Both networks were engaged in a highly competitive pursuit for island-wide viewer ratings for several years. Eventually, to stop further economic losses, Mediacorp and Singapore Press Holdings (SPH) agreed to merge their free-to-air television and free newspaper operations after several agreements on 17 September 2004. The merger between the two networks legally completed on 31 December of that year, creating the new holding company MediaCorp Television Broadcasting Arm which would manage and operate the remaining channels. Channel U survived the transfer into the Mediacorp network on New Year's Day, Channel i however ceased broadcasting due to its commercial liability.

On 1 January 2007, HD5 was launched and Channel 5 became the first digital terrestrial television station in Singapore to broadcast in high-definition. MediaCorp also launched MOBTV, an online television service. Its radio division was forced to lock listeners from the United States out of its webcasts, due to royalty rates imposed by the US Copyright Royalty Board.

On 19 October 2008, TV12 Central dissolved to become two separate channels: Okto, which succeeded the Kids and Arts slots of the channel; and Vasantham, a exclusively Tamil language channel succeeding the Vasantham Central slot.

2008-present: Transition to digital broadcasting
Channel NewsAsia commenced their 24-hour broadcasts on 21 January 2013. On 30 September of the same year, Mediacorp shut down its Teletext service, while on 16 December, all MediaCorp free-to-air channels were upgraded to DVB-T2 format with new ring of upgrades accelerated for households.

2015 saw the network's channels kick starting their high definition broadcast: Okto on 4 May and CNA on 26 May. On 8 December of the same year, Mediacorp opened its new premises at Mediapolis@one-north in Buona Vista, plus introducing its new corporate branding. Mediacorp will vacate its premises at Caldecott Hill progressively for a period of nine months.

Mediacorp switched its entire broadcasting operations over to become fully digital on 11 December 2016.

Television
Mediacorp offers seven free terrestrial television channels, and six high-definition channels As a result of the MediaCorp-MediaWorks merger in late 2004, Singapore Press Holdings currently holds a 20% interest in MediaCorp's TV operations.

TV drama and sitcom series
2014-2015
 * Chinese language
 * English language
 * ABC DJ (2006) - local English sitcom, starring Korean actor Eugene C. Lee
 * After Hours - local English drama, starring Linda Liao, Utt, Joanne Peh; two seasons
 * Code of Law (2012) - local English drama about the legal profession in Singapore, premiered 13 September 2012
 * Enbloc (2008) - local English drama, starring Patrick Teoh, Darren Lim, Nick Shen, Nathaniel Ho, Rebecca Lim
 * Fighting Spiders (2009) - Channel 5's drama, premiered 14 April 2009
 * First Touch (2000-2002) - local English drama, starring Edmund Chen, Amy Cheng, Vernetta Lopez, Nick Shen
 * Growing Up (1996-2001) - the longest running English drama in Singapore, spanning around 1960s - 1980s
 * Like My Own (2004) - local English drama, starring Flora Chan, Zhu Mi Mi, Ho Wen Long, Amy Cheng
 * Living with Lydia - local English sitcom, starring Lydia Sum
 * Maggi & Me (2006) - local English sitcom, starring Adrian Pang and Fiona Xie, premiered 25 July 2006
 * Making Love (2000) - local English comedy, starring Andrea D'Cruz, Celest Chong, Jimmy T, Kevin Verghese
 * Masters of The Sea (1994) - TV drama
 * Moulmein High - local English drama, starring Cynthia Koh
 * Oh Carol! - local English sitcom, starring Carol Cheng
 * Phua Chu Kang (1997-2007) - local English sitcom, starring Gurmit Singh; criticized for its heavy use of Singlish)
 * Point of Entry (2010) - local English action-drama about an elite team of ICA, premiered 2 December 2010
 * Point of Entry 2 (2012) - local English action-drama about an elite team of ICA, premiered 5 January 2012
 * The Pupil (2010-2011) - local English drama, about the legal profession in Singapore, premiered 7 January 2010
 * Red Thread (2009) - local English drama, premiered 14 April 2009
 * Tiramisu (2005) - local English drama, starring Sharon Au
 * Under One Roof (1994) - the first local English sitcom, criticized for its use of Singlish
 * VR Man - TV drama; an attempt at making a superhero show with local personalities
 * Yang Sisters (2006) - local English sitcom, starring Cheng Pei-pei, premiered 28 September 2006


 * Tamil language
 * Nijangal
 * Pradhana Vizha
 * Pradhana Vizha 2014
 * Vettai - Season 1: Vettai : Pledged to Hunt; Season 3: Vettai 3 : The Final Judgment

News



 * Berita - Suria's flagship news programme in Malay, first shown at 8pm SST and repeats at 11:30pm SST
 * Tamil Seithi - Vasantham's flagship news programme in Tamil, shown at 8:30pm SST and repeats at 11:30pm SST on Monday to Wednesday, time varies before closedown on Thursdays to Sundays
 *  News 5 - Channel 5's and HD5's flagship news programme in English, shown at 9:00pm SST
 * Primetime World - Channel NewsAsia's flagship news programme in English, shown at 9:00pm SST
 * News Tonight - Channel 8's flagship news programme in Mandarin, first shown at 10:00pm SST and repeated on Channel U at 11:00pm SST

Other shows

 * Crime Watch - talk about crime prevention, partially based on the German programme; produced by MediaCorp and Singapore Police Force
 * True Files - cases of past murders
 * True Courage - the extraordinary courage of some Singaporeans

Radio
Mediacorp offers twelve free-to-air FM radio channels, all of which can be accessed online and via mobile apps. The company's digital audio broadcasting (DAB) service was discontinued on 1 December 2011.

Over-the-top broadcast: Toggle
Mediacorp offers free-to-air and pay-to-air over-the-top broadcasting website Toggle on 1 April 2015, after Xinmsn, a joint content website with Microsoft, was disbanded. Toggle provides additional content pertaining entertainment, lifestyle tips, news and information; and is accessible online on smart phones, tablets and connected TVs.