eMedia Investments Has Acquired Broadcasting Rights To Korean Telenovela Phoenix For eExtra

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eExtra is a general entertainment channel operated by eMedia Investments that offers a variety of telenovelas from Asia, India and Turkey. Through an ad, it has been announced that the broadcaster has picked up rights to the South Korean series Phoenix 2020 which is based on the 2004 drama, Phoenix.

eMedia Investments had chosen to distribute it as Phoenix with 2020 which derives from the year it was filmed dropped off. This will be the channel's first half hour Korean series with previous shows like High Society Scandal and Two Women that ran for a two hour duration.

Synopsis for Phoenix

Belonging to the wealthiest class and as the daughter of an influential chaebol family in Korea, Ji Eun grew up with everything. When she meets Se Hoon, who comes from an underprivileged family, he treats her like no other, and she falls in love with him. Although Ji Eun's family opposes their relationship, they get married. However, due to reoccurring conflicts, Ji Eun and Se Hoon become exhausted and end their marriage. Ten years later, fate ironically reverses their lives. Se Hoon, who is now a successful man, buys Ji Eun's house out of revenge. But when he stands in front of her as Willian Jang, he only wants to help her. Nonetheless, there is Mi Ran, with whom he is in a serious relationship with, and next to Ji Eun is her new love, Jung Min, who is devoted to her.

It starred Hong Soo Ah as Lee Ji Eun, Lee Jae Woo as Jang Sae Hoon / William Jang, Seo Ha Joon as Seo Jung Min, Park Young Rin as Yoon Mi Ran and Yang Hye Jin as Cho Hyeon Sook. 

Phoenix broadcasts daily on eExtra from 29 April.

Reminder: Umshado Lento Launches In May On Zee Zonke

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Below is the English and Zulu unofficial promos for Umshado Lento

Canal+'s MultiChoice Expected To Finalize Takeover By October 2025

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MultiChoice Group Ltd and Canal+ SA on Tuesday said they are on track to clear all conditions in a deal that will see the French group take over the South African entertainment company.

Back on March 4, the two companies said they had extended the long stop date to October 8 from April 8 to fulfill all the conditions facing the proposed offer.

The proposed takeover is subject to clearance from South African competition authorities and other regulatory approvals continues.

Canal+ early in June last year improved its offer for MultiChoice to R 125 per share, a 67% premium to MultiChoice’s closing price of R 75 before Canal+ first approached MultiChoice investors on February 1 last year. The French group formally made the offer early in April.

Canal+’s mandatory offer to MultiChoice shareholders opened early in June last year and closes on April 25 this year.

In February, MultiChoice and Canal+ said they had concluded their discussions over the structure of MultiChoice after the takeover.

This proposed structure ensures that the MultiChoice acquisition complies with foreign control regulations and maintain MultiChoice’s broad-based black economic empowerment credentials, the two companies said then.

In terms of the proposed structure, MultiChoice will be restructured so that the current holder of the broadcasting licence in South Africa and the entity which contracts with South African subscribers, MultiChoice (Pty) Ltd or Licence Co, will be carved out of the MultiChoice group and will become an independent entity.

The remainder of MultiChoice’s video entertainment assets will remain part of the MultiChoice Group.

Licence Co will continue to hold the subscription broadcasting licence in South Africa,and it will continue to contract with MultiChoice’s South African subscribers.

DStv, Openview And StarSat Channel Changes From 01 January 2024 To 31 March 2025

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Due to some restructuring that we had discussed in 2024, we opted to make some minor adjustments on how content is maintained on the website. Below we have summarised events that occurred in 2024 and trust me when I say that it was one of gruesome years for publishers such as myself but we strive to continue operating at minimum capacity.

Openview

Following the rollout of Ultraview, the pay-tv extension of Openview had lost two channels in under a year, OUTtv and FUSE. These were youth oriented channels priced at R75p/m that eMedia Investments had since integrated with the rest of eVOD's offering leaving the Bollywood channels.

As we've stated in 2024, eMedia Investments hadn't disclosed how many subscribers Ultraview accumulated but it is believed to low and also what prompted the closure of EDGE. Also to note was the lack of additions in this financial period with Sporty TV being the first new channel in over two years.

Other developments to have occured involved one of their existing offerings People's Weather that was axed from DStv and since became People's Planet.

StarSat 

After operating illegally for over a year, StarSat was forcibly shuttered in South Africa following a raid by ICASA and law enforcement which affected several channels in other African countries. On Digital Media which held the broadcasting license has since been liquidated with no further action by both parties.

Consumers who were owed money were encouraged to contact On Digital Media if they wished to collect their bounty.

Similar to Openview, the financial period hasn't been the most productive of years with the rise in streaming. The only addition for the company during its lifespan at the time was ST Movies which if I can recall was ousted from the platform for unknown reasons and revived following the removal of TNT.

DStv

2024 has proven to be treacherous year for DStv amidst it's takeover by Canal+ had ousted 11 channels including People's Weather, Ginx TV, B4U Movies, Africa Magic Urban, One Freestate Televisual, DW, NWTV, PBS Kids, Emmanuel TV, Me and 1Max (formerly 1Magic).

As for additions, there was Arise News after being made exclusive to DStv consumers in the West and Eastern parts of Africa expanded to Southern Africa.

Other developments included the expansions of services SuperSport Action (Compact), CBS Justice (Compact), Comedy Central (Family), HGTV (Family), Nicktoons (Access) and WildEarth (Easyview). Readers are advised to view the summary below for the full list of channels.

Summary 

New channels/rebrands: 

• Arise News (DStv)

• 1Max (DStv, closed)

• Sporty TV (Openview)

• People's Planet (Openview)

• ST Movies (StarSat)

Expansions (on DStv):

 

• Arise News (Southern Africa)

• SuperSport Action (Compact+ to Compact)

• Africa Magic Showcase (Compact+ to Compact)

• CBS Justice (Compact+ to Compact)

• History (Compact+ to Compact)

• Curiosity (Compact+ to Compact)

• Nickelodeon (Compact+ to Compact)

• Nick Jr. (Compact+ to Compact)

• HGTV (Compact to Family)

• Disney Channel (Compact to Family)

• Comedy Central (Compact to Family)

• ROK (Compact to Access)

• Zee World (Family to Access)

• Nicktoons (Family to Access)

• SuperSport La Liga (Family to Access)

• WildEarth (Access to Easyview) 

• SuperSport Schools (Access to Easyview)

Closures (Openview in bold): 

• PBS Kids

• One Freestate Televisual

• NWTV

• 1Max (formerly 1Magic)

• Me

• WildEarth

• Emmanuel TV

• B4U Movies

• Ginx TV

• DW

• People's Weather (now People's Planet)

• Africa Magic Urban

• OUTtv 

• FUSE 

New Channel Alert (Rumour): Third ROK Channel Supposedly In Early Development On DStv

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MultiChoice is currently undergoing a takeover bid by ROK owners Canal+ with local legislation as the two look to tie the knot by October 2025. This comes after both parties were looking to finalize the transaction later in the week with Africa Magic and ROK folded under the same umbrella.

ROK has been described as the leading broadcaster for Nollywood films and series prior to Canal+'s growing interest in MultiChoice distributed the brand amongst DStv and Canal+ platforms. Formerly owned by iROKO TV, it spawned 2 regional channels one seen in the UK another in the Eastern and Western parts of Africa.

It appears that MultiChoice will be duplicating this offering soon as they've begun work on a third TV channel with ROK's recent blockbusters Miss Cole and Service Agreement. We can only assume with minimal offering that this channel is in early development.

With no series in site, it could as well be a complimentary offering to Africa Magic Epic which is devoted to primarily movies. In general, we're not expecting anything newsworthy from this and it will be weird if it did become a movie channel considering how much of is that is already on ROK.

MultiChoice has been streamlining it's offering over the years which led the cancellation of Africa Magic Urban and mergers between BBC First and BBC Brit. The latter is being optimised for Netflix and MultiChoice is hoping with the Comcast deal that Showmax reaches that scale in Africa.

Estimated guess is that the newcomer possibly ROK Movies will be placed on channels 140-159 which is battered with other repeat tailored channels such as Magic Showcase, KykNet Lekker and Moja 9.9. 

With the MultiChoice/Canal+ deal underway, it's a safe bet to predict that ROK and Africa Magic won't form part of some major overhaul if the deal were to be approved. However there could as well be some restructuring to their regional offering particularly for brands like Africa Magic Hausa which could be seen with ROK content.